Rolled Hem

Here's another of the advanced sewing techniques I want to learn this year: the rolled hem on the end of this scarf.

I found this slightly sheer heart-printed scarf at the Dollar Tree. It's sold as an infinity scarf, but I wanted to turn it into a simple long narrow scarf. I chose this particular scarf as my project because it's a super lightweight fabric and it only cost $.125. If my first attempt didn't go well, I can simply cut the scarf a little shorter and try again. It's not high stakes. 

So first, I cut off the seam that fastened the two ends together.

Using the "silk" setting on my iron, I pressed out the wrinkles.

Then I squared off the cut edge with my rotary cutter and a ruler to make a clean edge.

I sewed a basting stitch 1/8 of an inch along the cut edges.

Then I pressed the edge over 1/8 of an inch. 

I pressed the edge over another 1/8 of an inch, holding the hem in place with pins. I gave this a good shot of steam with my iron to hold things in place. The ends of the hem didn't want to stay put, though the steam helped quite a bit. But keeping the ends tucked in with fabric that frays so much was quite a challenge so I pinned to the very edge of the hem.

Since I had some trouble with the folded hem staying in place on the first end of the scarf, I used some spray sizing (sort of like starch, but formulated for lightweight fabrics) on the second end before trying the first 1/8 inch fold. I gave it another shot of sizing and steam before the second fold. I think it helped a little. I really had to take my time with this step.

It was finally time to snap on my new rolled hem sewing machine foot. At first, I couldn't get the needle to work correctly. It kept bumping into the sewing machine foot. I was afraid I bought the wrong size of rolled hem foot for my machine. Oh, no! But after fiddling with it for about 15 minutes, I figured out that if I lifted the front of the foot a smidge as I started the hem, it worked because as I sewed, the fabric coming into the foot would lift the front in just the same way.

I started with the needle going through all layers of the hem at the edge of the scarf. Needle down position. I took a couple stitches as close to the edge of the fabric as possible. Then I manipulated the fabric into the "corkscrew" part of the rolled hem foot. That is tricky! I used a stylus and a pin to lift the fabric gently into place in the corkscrew. Then I sewed s-l-o-w-l-y. Once placed correctly, the foot helped keep that tiny hem rolled in just the right position to make a teeny hem.

One trick I figured out to help the fabric stay in that corkscrew was to hold the fabric feeding into the foot at a slight angle. That way the fabric didn't inadvertently slip out of the foot.

The fabric did stretch a little as I sewed (probably due to that extra angled feeding), so the end of the hem overlapped the side a tad. I just cut if off.

At the starting end, before the fabric was fed into the foot, there were a few missing stitches. This little scarf could have survived just fine without them, but since I'm in the learning phase, I decided to thread a needle with one of the leading threads and hand sew two or three stitches to finish the hem off nicely.

Results! The inside/back of the rolled hem:

The outside/front of the hem:

I must say ...I'm am very very very pleased with the result! In past years I tried to learn to do this, always with pathetic results. I just couldn't get the fabric to stay in the corkscrew. But using a lightweight fabric, staystitching, using sizing and steam, and pressing well made all the difference. I feel like I've finally learned this technique and will be able to replicate it.

Halleluiah!

I used this video to help me learn the technique. It doesn't say anything about staystitching or using sizing. Those were my ideas wrought from experience.