Stuff It!

Recently I made a quick trip to Children’s Corner Store for a Sit ‘n Sew. I can’t sing enough praises for Sit ‘n Sews. It’s such an amazing way to make connections with other sewists, learn new tricks, and spend time with women who love helping and celebrating other women.

During this trip, I belly laughed, I made new friends, I vented, I was inspired and I worked on the boy version of the Children’s Corner Pattern, Alex.

This is a straight-forward sew with extremely well-written directions. The only deviation I made from the pattern was in regards to strap length-they were a bit too long for Robby. Make sure to measure your little one. One of the really nice features of this new pattern is that it has a crotch extension-I feel these help clean up a garment and allow it to lay correctly even with snaps. Don’t get me started on how much I love the girl’s blouse pattern. It is modern, classic and again, has those wonderfully written directions.

While there, I learned about this new notion: The Stuff It. Prior to this trip I had been using a chopstick to push out my corners…this thing is a game changer. Here is a different version of the notion that I’ve heard great things about.

I was introduced to the Stuff It when I asked Susan (the fabulous instructor) for help with the tab found in the Basics for Boys III View B. I’ve tried to make that tab about six times with little success. I found that I had an extremely difficult time getting sharp points, making it the shape it was intended to be, and piping it. Susan helped a ton; I learned that you cannot pipe that tab and that I should be using The Stuff It (or any other long point turner). I’ll keep y’all updated on how my next one goes.

I also learned that you can use a point turner to help with sashes and straps.

Annnnd here’s where I admit something embarrassing. Apparently I’ve been turning sashes, ties, and literally any long rectangle that I’ve ever sewn, incorrectly. I typically turned them from the open end, pulling the long closed end toward me. It is a lot easier to push the closed end out. Like, a lot easier. A LOT.

Also, another random tip that I think helps straps look more polished is to add baby interfacing to the strap prior to sewing it (I didn’t do it in these pictures because I did them solely as a tutorial), then topstitching the strap once it’s made. I’ve found this helps a ton with future ironing as well.

I hope this helps someone other than me…(selfishly) so I know I wasn’t the only one doing it incorrectly. I used to make my husband turn bonnet straps for me because I thought it was so tedious.

Turns out, I was just doing it wrong.

…pun intended 🙂