Tip-sy Tuesday: sewing tip

I made a different kind of mask yesterday - even tho most of our mask mandates are over, I have lots of material and thought I'd try something different from my standard - and favorite - pleated one. I will still be wearing a mask in certain situations, and it's fun to have choices when it comes to masks. Anyway - I learned a little trick to help feed the corners of fabric under the sewing machine needle and thought I'd share. 

Very often when I'm feeding a piece of material into the machine, the edge won't catch and ends up balling up under the needle - ugh. So annoying. When watching a video on how to make this new mask she had a 'leader' piece of fabric that guides the fabric you want to sew under the needle so much easier.

 Just fold a small piece of scrap fabric into a small rectangle or square, maybe 3 or 4 layers, and sew over it - before cutting it off, feed your project fabric under the needle and the 'leader' scrap makes it so the project fabric doesn't get caught. I'm making this sound much more complicated than it is so I took some pictures! 

Make sense now? You don't need to cut the thread after sewing each piece - once all of your pieces are sewn you just clip them apart. This is quite the handy trick! 

6.29.20: RV living (privacy curtain)

6.29.19: 3D paper stars

6.29.18: Lisa's button flag art
6.29.17: make a red, white, and blue windsock
6.29.16: patriotic potato salad