There are many things in the world that are frustrating. Perhaps one of the most frustrating of all is trying to sew stretch fabrics. I don't know why I do it to myself, but here we go.
Our task for today is to replace the elastic in these thermal cycling arm warmers. At some point back at my old apartment they got cooked by the dry cycle of the shitty all-in-one washer/dryer, and instead of the elastic stretching when you tug on it, it just makes unsettling crunching noises.
Sorry, tag. You're about to be removed.
After about an hour of ripping stitches, the old elastic has been liberated. As you can see by the fact that it's almost twice the size of the sleeve I pulled it out of, its willingness, and perhaps even ability, to contract to its original size had long since expired.
I'm going to omit recounting about two hours worth of swearing at inanimate objects and just skip to the end. Needless to say, sewing stretch fabrics is really not pleasant, as they tend to move around in the most obnoxious way under the presser foot, and there's simply no way to pin them well enough to keep them in place. Especially when there's so little seam allowance to work with.
I was careful to pose this photo to show off the least bad parts of the stitching.
There are two avenues I intend to explore after this experience.
The first is to try using a stretchable iron-on adhesive to substitute for the pinning, which I'm hoping will keep the different layers of fabric in place long enough to run them through the sewing machine.
The second is to try getting a coverstitch machine. The upside is that this type of sewing machine is basically designed for the task of sewing stretch fabrics. The downside is that the price of entry generally starts around $500, which is a lot of money for something I might only use once or twice a year.
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