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Show Hemming Jeans Is A Sewing Art By BETTY W. KINSER Copley News Service It doesn't seem so long ago that all jeans we bought were just barely long enough until the first washing. Then they were too short. It was something some-thing we had learned to live with. NOW not being able to find a happy medium the industry in-dustry gives us jeans that are too long much too long. So they must be hemmed. Hemming jeans is not the same as hemming anything else you have ever worked on believe me. BEFORE YOU begin, run your jeans through the washer and dryer a time or two (or take them to the cleaners! to take care of any shrinking they might do. Mark the hemline. Measure dpwn from hemline one and one-fourth inches. Cut along this second line. Tune up raw edges five-eighths inch. Press. Turn up again t'ive-eighlhs t'ive-eighlhs inch. Press. Working from the right side of the garment, topstitch hem one half inch from fold. EASY? NOT really. There will be at least one flat-felled seam on each leg to deal with, and that's where the trouble starts. It" you stop and count the lay ers of fabric in the hem at this point, it w ill boggle your mind. To avoid as much trouble as possible, select your weapons . carefully a large needle4J8i. two upper treads, a ,Jjshtly loosened upper tension ahd long stitches. If your machine has a "low" gear, shift down. AS YOl' approach the thick area, lengthen the stitch a bit more . and if necessary " w ul k " your machine over the hump by turning the wheel by hand. Once vou have cleared the thick area, return stitch to original ori-ginal length. Sortie machines will skip stitches as they come down off the thick areas. Finish hemming, hem-ming, then go back aand stitch this "skipped" portion from the opposite direction to till in. Pull treads to wrong side and tie off. ON JEANS, hems done bv land or fused in will not stav. o you might as well go ahead md do it by machine. |