There's a variety of universal stitches on this machine that are great techniques that
you really need to just know about and try them out sometime.
We're going to start with Stitch #5.
Stitch #5 is a securing stitch.
It has a built-in backstitch after it stitches about five stitches forward it goes five stitches
back without you having to do anything.
So pretty much as you sew all the way down to the end of your fabric, we'll just say
we're there, touch your reverse button one time.
That's it.
It will go ahead and stop, stitch five stitches back, five stitches forward and my foot's
still on the foot control and it has stopped for me.
So this sequence is a great one to use any time you're doing garment sewing, working
with home dec fabrics or just something where your hands are too busy to hold that reverse
button in, and it allows you to have the locking stitches right where you need them.
Once you've completed this stitch it's ready to start again.
So you can just start sewing and it will do the five stitches forward, five back and then
take off.
If you're right at the end of the fabric this is how it's going to look.
You touch it when you get to the end and then finish it out.
Love that stitch.
Next let's talk about a triple straight stitch.
That is Stitch #6.
It's actually got two stitches pictured next to each other, and I'm going to stitch along
the bias or the diagonal part of the fabric to show off how this actually stretches.
What this stitch is going to do is it's going to take two stitches forward, one stitch back
so it's going to be a tripley-stitched seam.
Number one, it is very secure, and number two it's actually stretchy, but when you see
it up close, you're going to notice that it has a very unique look.
It's going to look like you've stitched with extra thick thread like a topstitching thread,
but to tell you the truth topstitching thread doesn't come in a ton colors.
So if you want hot pink or variegated, you don't have to go to the store to buy anything.
Just reach for your spool of thread of your choice and then go ahead and pick that particular
stitch, but it's stretchy too.
So a back part of a pair of pants like where the seat is, or where you're going to be sitting
down, you don't want that to bust open.
You want it really secure and also have the give along the bias of the fabric.
Excellent stitch for this.
Now that other stitch that's pictured beside it is a zigzag version of the triple stitch.
All you need to do is with Stitch #6 selected go ahead and add width.
So I'm going to take this all the way up to the width of four, and now you have a zigzag.
So it's going to do the same thing two stitches forward, one stich back.
It will look tripley stitched, kind of looks like rick rack-like.
It's really a neat stitch.
Also, try that with variegated thread sometime.
It really is a pretty stitch.
You can add some neat decorative features to some of your future projects.
Back to this straight version.
I've often used that where I might have a bag handle coming in to the top of a bag,
and then I'll use that to really reinforce it yet it doesn't look like I've stitched
it three times and make it look homemade.
This looks nice and professional.
Let's try out a couple of some overlock stitches.
As we stitch we can take our fabric, run it along the edge of our foot, or right on the
inside.
These are going to be the stitches that are going to recommend a different foot.
So Stitch 8 for example recommends foot #2 the overlock foot.
Pretty much these are stitches that as you stitch them part of the stitch goes off the
edge of the fabric and part of it stays on the fabric.
There's a variety of different stitches that will do this plus it's sewing the seam together
and then making sure that it's not coming undone, as in, not unraveling any further
when you start to wash it.
These are stitches that you want to use when you don't own a serger, or if the serger that
you have is threaded with a different color than the short distance you need to do.
Oh, it's nice to know which stitches will kind of make it look like you did it on the
serger.
It will just take longer.
Sergers are just so much faster.
They really save a lot of time.
There you go.
So that's how it will look.
Those will not unravel any further and the seam is stitched all at once.
Another stitch that we can use along that line, Stitch #15 is another stitch and 16
also.
So let's use one of those and we'll kind of do an off-the-edge type of technique.
I'm going to take our fabric here just kind of cut a little neckline open just a little
curve, and then take some fabric that is also very stretchy, fold it for a ribbing like
look.
Again, an overlock foot is going to make this a lot easier.
So definitely look into getting one of those especially if you don't have a serger, and
what that does is it makes the foot is only half the distance so you know exactly where
to run this.
This one makes it so you have to kind of guess a little bit.
Another stitch to use is Stitch #3, also recommends that overlock foot.
I'm going to just kind of gently pull this as we stitch around that circle there.
So it's kind of overlocking it and stitching it all at once.
All right, so we kind of got that right around the edge, and then when you take a look it
is all in there and will stretch and give as you need it to go.
Another stitch, a super stretch stitch, that's Stitch #9 on the front of your machine.
Working with fabrics that you just need to sew a seam, but they don't need to be overlocked.
This stitch instead of a straight stitch which would pop if you stretched it, it kind of
looks like what I call a lightning bolt so it has a down and a back, down and a back,
and it's going to give a very tight looking stitch, but yet it's very stretchy.
Now if you have fabric that is very stretchy and it's kind of giving you trouble in coming
out wavy put that locking foot on and you'll have no problem in the wave department.
Let's see where we're looking here.
See how that's nice and even as it stitches and look how far that would stretch, and if
that was a straight stitch we would have broken all those stitches when we pulled on it.
Another thing we can do is with some elastic.
A universal stitch is Stitch #17, #17 where you can stitch some elastic.
I do recommend a stretch needle when stitching through elastic because once you start stitching
and I do like to lengthen this out just a little bit because as I pull it it's going
to kind of make it so it doesn't feed through as quickly and those stitches get awfully
close together.
But if you ever get any skipped stitches when you're stitching through elastic, that's because
the rubber in the elastic has kind of built up friction on the needle and a stretch needle
will solve that instantly.
Check out all of our needle videos and you can learn kind of what each needle does, but
isn't that nice where we can use that to kind of gather up.
The more you pull the more it gathers.