Hey everyone welcome back. I'm Wendy and this - we're going to call SEW IT BEGINS.
It's a series where I'm going to give you ~everything~ you need to know to begin sewing.
In this series, I'm going to take you through supplies.
I'm going to keep things real affordable, and I'm also going to be in the comments to help you out as much as possible,
I can't answer every single thing.
But if it's a question that I feel like a lot of people will appreciate an answer to, I will do my best.
In case you're brand new here, I hope you can trust me with this process because I also know what it's like to start with the easy stuff and grow from there.
Like I've never gone to fashion school and
everything I know is 'I got it from my momma' or the Internet.
So... we're gonna do this together *claps*.
In this first video, I would like to talk about sewing supplies.
And I want to break that all down into levels because I feel like there's an aspect of sewing where it's like
"There's so many supplies needed" "That's intimidating" "I don't want to spend all the money" "I don't want to start"
It's kind of like if you were on your very first time cooking and you were like, we're gonna sous vide a chicken.
Like there's so many way easier and very delicious things to make before you get to this like super fancy level of cooking.
And likewise with sewing, there's actually so much to enjoy before you get to the whole
"Sewing machine" and
"I have an ironing board" and
"Over there is my body form"
No, you can start with the really basic stuff and still enjoy sewing.
We're gonna start with level 1 of sewing where all you need for that is
Needle,
thread,
scissors.
This is a sewing kit that I got at the dollar store (I think)
and it's got needles, it's got a couple of different threads.
It's got tiny dinky scissors that like your kitchen scissors are probably better than this.
It even has a folded up measuring tape and a needle threader.
What's that? *shakes aggressively*
Oh and safety pins, so that's even more than you need it for level one.
But level one will get you to all basic mending.
Actually this shirt I'm wearing today, I wore it purposefully because
Um the bottom button has fallen off so actually but I could fix it with this kit.
Okay red thread, needles, (laughs at the scissors).
Oh gosh it can't even cut the thread.
I came here to prove a point about using the dollar store stuff. But these scissors, they cannot cut it sharp.
YES okay it's threaded.
This is the spot where the button is supposed to be.
~ba-bing~
The thing that trick alone can earn you quite a few points with yourself and with your friends.
There's going to be so many more pieces of clothing that you can extend the life of.
The number of times friends have come up to me and asked if I could help them repair something with buttons.
Yeah now if you have that hole in the front of your shirt that always rubs against the pants and develops a hole there,
you can fix that hole.
I have a tutorial for that.
Or if you're going to some party and you're like
"I wish the back pocket of my pants had sequins all over it",
you can sew those on!
The needle, thread and scissors is all you need to start enjoying sewing at level one.
(This is like the instant noodles enjoyment version).
If you're ready to move on to level 2, as I call it, things that will help you in that are
a measuring tape or stick, but tape will probably help you more.
A pair of fabric scissors so you can cut through fabric instead of using your kitchen scissors.
Some pins or clips
and some glue or hem tape.
This will cover all beginner (small to medium sized) projects.
At this point, you can adjust your pant lengths,
you can also make a crop top and other really basic thrift modifications.
I mean if you had the scissors, maybe you could have done the crop top thing already.
But now it's gonna look a little bit more professional because you can use the hem tape to like
close it off and not everything has to be ripped, distressed look.
This brings me to the pants that I'm wearing.
When I'm standing, I found these pants to be kind of on an awkward spot on my ankle.
And I don't appreciate it because it's limiting the number of times I get to weigh these pants so
let's do some level 2 modification on these pants.
Ok, this now reflects a much more accurate view of what it's like to be sewing... which is sewing in your underwear.
I can't be alone in this. There has to be other people who sew in their underwear too.
Using a tape measure, I have already measured out the distance that I want to remove,
and it's nice to measure it because in that way you can be consistent all the way around.
So we're going to... measure that, fold it out of the way and then pin it.
Now for this part if you really wanted things to go fast, you could use hem tape.
I have a weird habit of not using hem tape (that's why I'm gonna sew it) but hem tape or even fabric glue.
Okay.
You might want to add hair straightener to the list.
Oh that was steamy.
Ah yes one is definitely shorter.
Oh hey, but I'm into this.
Yeah I'm like ten times more likely going to wear this out now.
~success~
Finally that takes us to level three.
This is perhaps the stage where most people thought you would start when it comes to sewing, but it's not (!).
It's all the way in level three.
There's so much fun to be had in level one and two before you get to level three, which is...
the sewing machine, as you may expect.
Once you have a sewing machine, you can do all...
ALL beginner sewing projects and you can do items that are progressively bigger.
And the reason why I bring this whole sized thing into it is because when you're doing things by hand, it's slow,
and so naturally, you should focus on projects that are small, maybe medium in size.
But I post tutorials where I'm making full-on like dresses, backpacks, jackets.
And there's always that one comment that's like "This is great, could I do this by hand?"
And you think you're asking: 'Could I do this by hand?'
But what you're really asking is: 'Do I have the highest ranking patience in the whole world?'
And I just don't know how to answer that like I believe in you but
there's many things that I would advise using a machine for,
instead of doing it with your own hands.
With the sewing machine, you can make pretty much anything from scratch.
Quite a few of my sewing tutorials involve a sewing machine because I'm making stuff from scratch.
There are way more sewing supplies that you can purchase,
as with like filling your kitchen with all sorts of kitchen doodads.
And so I'm not trying to pretend they don't exist.
All I'm trying to say is,
after the sewing machine, so many of the things you can get are just to help you make things
faster, or prettier or more professional.
That's more getting into like pin cushions like my fancy pin cushion bracelet.
And it's because you want a nice place to hold your pins.
You can get pinking shears. Those just are different fancy scissors to help finish off the ends so they don't fray.
You can get a rotary cutter and a mat and the acrylic ruler if you want to cut through a lot of layers at once with a really nice straight line.
And you could also probably get an iron, instead of
Um using a hair straightener like I've been doing for a long time.
That is the basics of sewing supplies.
If you feel like I missed something, which I might have, please include it in the comments and
I will highlight the ones that I want people to remember.
I also am very aware that just mentioning sewing machines and glossing over, did not do the sewing machine world justice.
So the next episode in this series is going to be all about sewing machines.
We're gonna go into what kind of features are non-negotiable,
What kind of price ranges there are, also what kind of features there are as you move up in the price range?
I have an old sewing machine video, but this one is gonna be so much better.
Thank you all so much for watching, I really hope this was a helpful introduction to sewing.
Also thank you for being the motivation for me to mend this shirt and tailor the length of these pants.
Tag me in your projects, DM me with your questions.
I am @withwendy on Instagram and if you're subscribed then I will see you next time.
Buh bye~