New Series: Sewing Lessons

The Polka Dot Chair has a new friend:

Polka Dot Chair meet 710, now 710 meet the Polka Dot Chair. Y’all get along now.

Last month I welcomed a fun new addition to my sewing room. The Bernina 710 (I’m in love with it, but more about that later).

This machine joined my sewing room as a part of a partnership between myself and Bernina and WeAllSew.com . I’m happy to announce that for the next 12 months there will be a new series here on my blog. Sewing Lessons.

Each month I will be sharing with you a special tip or technique to help you with your sewing. Have you ever sewn something then at the end been unhappy with the quality of your finished project? Well we’ve ALL been there! Just last week I had a major sewing fail on one of my recent sewing tutorials. I ended up making a box zip pouch that didn’t EVEN ZIP UP! Yea, total fail there.

My plan is to share with you a bit of what I’ve learned in 25+ years of sewing. Some months will be technique focused and some months will be project focused. But each one will be something to help you improve your sewing skills and hopefully consistently sew projects that you are proud of. I’m hoping that you all LOVE this new series and are able to learn some new things.

As part of this series Bernina sent me a 710 machine to review and borrow for a year (no I do not get to keep it, but I might move so they can’t find me at the end of the year *wink*).

I just got the machine a few weeks ago and have already put it to good use, forgive me for a moment as I sing some of it’s praises.

First, HELLO GIANT BOBBIN! Nothing bugs me more than being in the middle of a big project and constantly changing the bobbin. This one holds gobs of more thread that my other one did.

Detachable sewing table with measurements! This year I’ve been working on my quilting skills, trying to better improve my seams and attempt some more difficult piecing projects. If you can see in this photo, there is a line on the table at the 1/4″ measurement. It has helped so much in keeping my fabric feeding straight through my machine as I sew. My seam accuracy has improved.

Large throat size! On a sewing machine the “throat” is the space between the needle and the side of the machine. If you’ve ever sewn a big quilt you know that this space is very critical to the “frustration” factor when machine quilting. Larger throat size, room for more fabric.

It has a BUILT in walking foot!!!! I think this might be my favorite feature so far. A walking foot is used for more than just machine quilting. It can also be very helpful when sewing multiple layers of fabric together (such as in closing the top of a bag). It’s been so convenient to just pop it down and sew when I’m having a bit of trouble with fabric bunching up.

I hope you’re as excited as I am about this new series. The first lesson with be up in May! If there is something specific that you’d like for me to cover in a lesson PLEASE let me know! I want this series to be beneficial to you, so let me know– What do you want to learn?

You will also be able to find me as a contributing author to the WeAllSew blog, my first post is up there today. Stop by and tell the folks at We All Sew HELLO from the Polka Dot Chair.

*Disclosure: To sponsor this series, Bernina sent me a machine to review at no charge to me. It’s on loan only, I don’t get to keep it. No other compensation was received. All opinions have been and will always be 100% my own.

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