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Sewing with a Serger: My First Impressions

What Would Julia Do? A T-Shirt Appliqué Dress Refashion
Mai-Linh's Reader ReFash!

After a long, long, loooooong week, all I wanted to do was check out some art on Main Street at First Thursdays on Main art crawl!

But what would I wear for this hot & humid evening?

sewing with a serger before dress
This. I shall wear this.

The fit is lousy, and I hate those stupid side-tie thingies!  

Time to take this dress from dowdy to darling!

First, I lopped off those stupid side ties!

snipping off side ties
Snip!

Then, I stitched the two ends together.

sewing
Like this!

I snipped off that extra little bit of fabric and put my new tie-thingy aside.

Usually I don’t chop off any length until I’ve taken my piece in, but in this case, I just didn’t feel like stitching down the side slits on this dress.

Sooooo…I just cut off the parts with the slits.

Slits!
Slits!
shortening dress
See ya, slits!

Now for the dress!  

I decided to take it in exactly 1″ on each side.  

First I pinned…

Pinning side seam of dress
Pin!

…and THEN I whipped out THIS AWESOME THING!!!!!

sewing with a serger
WOWZA!

You’re looking at The Dreamstitcher, and my first serger!  As it’s tagline proudly proclaims, “IT’S A DREAM!  IT’S A STITCHER!  IT’S THE DREAMSTITCHER!”

dreamstitcher closeup
Life is but a dream!

So what does this crazy thing do, you ask?  Let me show ya!

sewing with an overlocker
THIS!!!

This amazing machine actually cuts the fabric while locking that raw edge so it won’t fray!  No more pinking shears for me!

I look forward to giving you a full review of this machine after I use it a good bit more.

The last thing I needed to do to complete this refashion was give it a new hem!  Back to my regular machine I went!

sewing a hem
Easy.

After a quick press, my new dress was done!  

I tied my sewn-together ties around my waist, had hopped down to Main Street!

dress sewn with serger
It matches my shoes perfectly!

There was much cool art to see!

The featured exhibit at Tapp's Art Center!
The featured exhibit at Tapp’s Art Center!
Crrrrreeeepy!
Crrrrreeeepy!
And this one will haunt my dreams!
And this one will haunt my dreams!
Post-art crawl drinks at Bourbon!
Post-art crawl drinks at Bourbon!

Cheers!

refashionista sewing with a serger before and after
What Would Julia Do? A T-Shirt Appliqué Dress Refashion
Mai-Linh's Reader ReFash!