A walking foot is a great accessory for quilters or people using lots of stretchy fabrics,
Minky’s, Cuddles, knits, fleeces, all those tend to stretch out and a walking foot actually
has teeth that walk on the top and work in conjunction with the feed dogs underneath
and help pull the fabric together.
Go ahead and take your screwdriver out.
We’re actually going to loosen the screw on the side and there’s two parts that actually
have to be lined up.
First off there is the part that’s going to go right where the screw has been loosened,
but there’s a second part.
This little arm it needs to go around the screw or the bar sticking out that loosens
our needle.
That part I tend to catch first and then bring it around to catch on the other side here.
One and two.
I wonder if I have my screw loosened up far enough, probably not.
Here we go.
I was just trying to get it so I didn’t have to pull it all the way out, but I think
I actually do.
There we go, a lot easier.
Then just go ahead and get that screw started in and get that tightened up.
Once that’s started we’ll tighten it with our screwdriver.
Being that this is a walking foot it has some vibration, so make sure you give that last
turn with the screwdriver; because, you don’t want that loosening up while you’re sewing.
Make sure that’s well attached here.
What’s nice is that you’ll be able to use this on any particular stitch, stitches
that go forward and back are all going to work with this particular foot.
I have just a little sandwich of fabric and batting that we’re going to start off with.
What you’re going to notice is that as I stitch these white feet come forward and pull
the top layer of fabric towards me.
I also have my stitch length closer to three for a little longer stitch length.
Usually those Cuddle and Minky fabrics, you need to be closer to 3-1/2 to 4 to really
get that to feed through and not get such tiny stitches.
Now some of the walking feet will actually come with optional guides and they will fit
into the back part.
There’s usually just a hole in the back and once you get that lined up you just push
it through.
Then what’s nice is
you
can just draw one line and then have perfectly parallel rows as you go and not have to actually
draw more than one thing.
I just noticed that my needle was not tight enough and it came out and so another note,
when you are tightening that screw.
Here we go, we’ll slide that all the way back up.
Give that a little extra tighten.
I’m going to make sure that I haven’t bent my needle.
I see my thread is actually linked around it here, so we’ll see if we’re going.
Yes, we’re doing good.
Operator error.
Make sure your needle is tight enough.
There we go.
Then what’s nice is as I go ahead and come out, if I want another row that’s perfectly
parallel to that one, just set the guide right on top of the line you just stitched.
Keep your eye over here and now we have row number two.
You can do this with decorative stitches.
You can have multiple rows of decorative stitches without have to mark every single row.
A walking foot is wonderful, especially even with flannels.
Those start to get a little bit stretchy and having a walking foot makes such a difference
and nice even stitches and no gaps on the back side.