​Hemstitching Can Be (More) Fun

Well, that is really questionable in my opinion.  I have never enjoyed hemstitching.  However, I have 2 really good tips to make it a little easier.

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​Tip 1:

The first tip is outright stolen from Jane Stafford’s Online Guild episodes.  If you are not a member of her guild, I highly recommend it: https://janestaffordtextiles.com/online-guild/
 
I used to weave a header, begin my woven fabric by weaving 8-10 picks, and then hemstitch the leading edge of the piece.  There is a problem with that technique.  Isolating the 2, 3 or 4 picks and the warp ends you want to hemstitch around can be a real challenge, because you have weaving on both sides of the picks to be hemstitched.
 
I even tried weaving in a slippery yarn as a separator pick before I would start weaving the piece.  This slippery yarn, in theory, would be removed after weaving a few picks of the piece, thereby making the hemstitching a little easier.  Well,  the “slippery” yarn is not always so easy to remove.
 
Along comes Jane Stafford who showed me that you really only need to carefully lay in the picks you want to hemstitch around and begin hemstitching.  No header, no weaving extra picks before starting the hemstitching. 

This is SO much easier that I cannot believe it never occurred to me.   Simply hemstitch around those picks and then proceed to weave you piece as usual.

• Lay in the picks you want to hemstitch around.
• Be careful to wrap the weft cleanly at the selvedges.
• Begin hemstitching as usual

After hemstitching simply continue weaving your piece, being careful to beat the first couple of picks in well.

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Tip 2:

The second tip improves your visibility for hemstitching.  Depending on the color of my warp, I find that seeing t​he warp ends and counting them correctly can be challenging.  I place a contrasting sheet of paper UNDER the warp, and voila: visibility improves dramatically.

BEFORE...

And AFTER adding white paper under the warp.

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