Anyone take sewing lessons ??

[turtleguy]

I might be a little late to the post but I joined a local quilting club. No I am not the youngest person there at 43 but it was close. Yes I am the only hetero male, I get so many cookies sent home with me.

Some of those women made all of their kids clothes and are very familiar with super thin fabrics like voile or tulle, so some ripstop or silpoly isn't really a stretch. Another bonus is they have a huge table. I mean huge. No No you don't understand its a big as my truck, for making a tarp or Top/Bottom Quilts you can have the whole thing laid out flat sure beats my living room floor.

Long story short, buy lots of cheap thin nylon or poly, make a ton of stuff sacks, kites, slings, pillows, rain mittens, tarps, sprawl cloths.... and ask for help/advice if that means taking a class or joining a club either are fine.

I got started sewing by buying an old boat and looking into what it would cost to have the upholstery redone.

[sideshowraheem]

I need to take some classes. I've muddled through some projects on my own, and watching some YouTube videos has helped, but a class would be really beneficial.

The owner of Empire Wool & Canvas offers a class at the Winter Camping Symposium usually, going to haul my sewing machine to his class next year and hope to pick up a thing or two. Thinking I'd like to sew a winter canvas tarp one day as a project.

[Zingger]

I'm a hack but have sewn a few hammocks and nets. For me getting the machine to behave with different fabrics is half the battle. My son-in-law has an industrial machine for boat canvas work that would probably be great for pack straps and webbing. My starter version Singer won't punch through the heavy stuff.

[sideshowraheem]

Thats my biggest challenge! I always struggle getting the feeder foot/dog/whatever its called, and good tension with some of the lighter fabrics. Pain in the butt!

Still im better at it now then I was, just gotta keep at it.

[mattnin]

Ordinary sewing and lightweight gear making sewing is different in many ways.
Can a set of lessons be tailored (pun) to learn some tricks?? Sure. But the UL fabric needs some special fine tuning to sew properly. And a good machine. And practice to learn the set-ups needed, IMO.

Years ago, I talked with the local sewing shop about lessons. They knew nothing about our popular fabrics. Could they sew? Heck yes. Curtains and pillows and skirts. But not a tarp in silnylon. Explaining a underquilt with baffles and differential cuts was over their heads and like deer in the headlights they said “Um, we don’t think we can help?”, and went back to sell dress fabrics to the ladies. Just being a guy in the local shop seem to set off the ladies weirdo alarms.
Lots of gear making vids to glean info on YouTube etc may be a better choice?

My friend's wife also is in a quilting club and used to be an inspector at a sewing factory and I asked for some tips. I got none. I showed her some of the slick silpoly and she said they never worked on anything so thin and fine. She also said if I could rank fabrics on a scale of 1 to 10, it takes decades to learn how to sew a level 10, and said I'm working on fabric that is like a level 50... I'm pretty stubborn though and determined and learned to sew and showed her some of my projects I managed to complete fairly well for my first time using the same fabric on a chunky, clunky elephant footed sailrite that should have no business sewing anything so fine as silpoly. All I can say is if you have a goal, don't give up, have patience, practice, and determination and you'll find a way.

There are a lot of helpful videos out there on youtube. If you search for what you are trying to do, like "roll hem", you'll find thousands of videos on it. But, for our type of fabric there are simply none better, that I've found, than Jellyfish's videos. She works with exactly our types of fabrics and shows techniques to overcome certain challenges, such as a roll hem on ultralight silpoly.

[XSrcing]

Too funny. We got a boat last year and I ended up dusting off my old sewing machine for the same reason.

[Druid011]

I'm looking to pick up sewing too. Would love any recommendations on YouTube channels or other resources.

[TominMN]

I'm looking to pick up sewing too. Would love any recommendations on YouTube channels or other resources.

See the last paragraph in post #15.

[Zingger]

I am a beginner but learned a great deal watching Jellyfish's videos. Like any other skill you need to get some basics and then jump in. Starting with cheaper easier to work with fabrics can be helpful and reduce the frustration factor. I think I'll leave the tarp making to Warbonnet but hammocks are easy enough.

[Crazytown3]

A big +1 on the Jellyfish videos, as well as her posts on Hammock Forums as well. Her calm, logical approach to tough sewing issues have taught me a lot. There were more than a few times her lessons took me from using bad language and wanting to give up, to giving it another try and actually completing projects.