my new serger

I have a new potential sewing friend...my new serger!  I say potential because we're not exactly BFFs yet.  We still have a little ways to go because one of us is a little persnickety and one of us is sometimes lacking in the patience department.  I'll let you figure it out.

This was my Christmas gift from my very generous and thoughtful parents.  It's very exciting because I can now sew finished seams more easily!

This is how my serger looked right out of the box.  It was threaded with color-coded thread for learning purposes.  Threading this thing is no easy task, but I am learning.

It came with a little scrap piece to show me what the serged edge should look like.  Then I practiced...a lot...on my own fabric scraps!  When I was finally feeling brave enough, I set out to sew my first pair of undies using the So, Zo...What Do You Know? pants pattern.

This is my first pair of pants (So, Zo is British!) waiting to be sewn up.  Sorry if this is too much information for you, I did ask myself if it was too much to be posting about sewing underwear on my blog, but I think this could inspire someone else to learn to sew them, because that's how I was inspired, so I determined that it's okay.  Don't worry, no modeling shots! That would be extremely weird.

The pattern is very easy to follow.  There are 3 pattern pieces: front, back, and gusset.  The only adjustment I had to make was going up 1 size.  The pattern advised that if your material isn't stretchy enough, you may have to do this.  The instructions are also easy to comprehend, but the process itself is just a little tricky to get the hang of.  It was especially hard for me to learn to sew the flat elastic on evenly.  I am still getting the hang of that!  But I think it just takes practice.  I serged the gusset and side seams, and sewed the elastic on with my regular sewing machine on the zig-zag stitch.  I think you could sew it on with the serger (with the top knife disabled) if you used regular flat elastic, but I chose picot (it has a decorative trim sticking off one edge) so the serger wouldn't work on it.  If you had a coverstitch machine then I assume it would be no problem.  If you don't sew and that sounds like a lot of crazy jargon, sorry!

Anyhow, I sewed three pairs of pants and the first two were practice pairs that I didn't completely finish, because some areas got a little wonky.  The practice was necessary and I'm glad I did practice on the real thing instead of just scrap fabric since this is such a small item and not much fabric was wasted.  Sewing the flat elastic around the curved leg openings is extra difficult!

My third pair was a winner and I hope to start a fourth this weekend and have even better success with it.  If you're thinking of sewing some pants for yourself, I'd say go for it!  If you don't have a serger, I wouldn't let that stop you.  I could have learned this a long time ago on my regular sewing machine.