Remembering water soluble thread

Talking to myself here but a little more about water soluble thread. If you have a choice, use the thread on the top instead of in the bobbin. It would be awful to forget it was in the bobbin and make some truly temporary blocks. Just awful. Furthermore, if you're in a humid climate, the thread just must be stored firmly sealed in plastic. Otherwise it can simply disappear. Polly

"Polly Esther" There's nothing new about water soluble thread; I reckon my little spool is

Can't wait to see the pics...and I'm curious about Louise's new cool tool, too.

--Heidi

Polly: Please help me understand this. You have water soluble thread in the top and regular thread in the bobbin. Yes? You 'baste' the folded binding edge in position. Then you load the SM with regular thread top and bobbin, and you sew again, this time as a permanent stitch. Yes? So, what happens to the regular thread that had been in the bobbin the first go round? When the w.s. thread 'disappears' is the bobbin thread now loose and not controlled?? PAT, confused in Virginia

Yes, Pat. Once the top thread is washed away, there is nothing for the bobbin thread to hook with, so it's free and can be removed with no cutting. A perfect stitch is formed with the bobbin and top thread meeting in the middle and "looping" (for want of a better term). around each other. Remove one, the other is attached to nothing. Gen

Thank, yes. You explained it more clearly than I did. I know that but wonder what happens to that loose thread once the second round of stitching has traveled around the binding. It seems to me that the second stitching would catch and hold the first round of bobbin thread, so it would be a bother to pick out. PAT

Gee. Glad I happened back down here. I didn't realize the water soluble discussion was still going on. The object of the game was to do a neat machine stitching of the binding instead of having to do it by hand on the 2nd trip around. While hand-stitching the 42 one-eared mice binding by hand, it became painfully apparent that my old wrists don't want to do that anymore. I made a sample about the size of a placemat and tested to see what would be both precise and gentle to my parts. Yes, Virginia Pat. When the water soluble upper thread dissolves, there is a bobbin 'real' thread hanging around. The bobbin thread used was a Loud one and was just as easy as pie to see and remove. The final stitch used to finish the binding is So hard to describe. None of those heavy embroidery stitches. They bog down and cuss at corners and seams. The stitch I love is a single line of stitches that draws a scallop or sort of clam shell line. The similar one on nearly any zigzag machine is one that zigs up about 3 stitches and then down about 3. I was about to show off my newly discovered camera skills and show you how well it works - but it works so well you can't see it. How good is that? Polly

"Mickie Swall" As I understand it, Polly will baste the b> Thank, yes. You explained it more clearly than I did. I know that but > wonder

My fault, Mickie. I just didn't explain very well. If only I could figure out how to talk with my hands here, things would be a lot clearer. Polly

"Mickie Swall"