Gathering Fabric- How to

This is more for me and the ease of future posts since I will be doing a lot of ruffle's since I have a baby girl on the way.  Then if you don't know how to make a ruffle you can go here and if you know how to make one you can just do it.

Here is how to gather fabric:

First cut the Fabric the length and width you need it.  It should always be 1.5x a length of the item you are making so you have room to gather it.  Width depends on how big you want the ruffle to be, on big people clothes 4-5" and on baby clothes I recommend 2" so you have room to hem up the bottom and tuck the top yucky piece away so everything looks neat and clean.

Second, Hem the bottom of the ruffle under.  On a child's ruffle I use 1/4" seam and on an adule ruffle I use 1/2".  This will keep things looking neat.  If you are going to see the top part of the ruffle.  I would recommend hemming the top part also.  This will again just keep things neat and clean!

 Third, Put your sewing machine on the greatest stitch length, and as loose as it can go. My greatest stitch length is 4.

Forth.  Sew about 1/4" from the top of the fabric all the way across. Leave long tails on both sides of the fabric, so you can use these.

Fifth, Now we are going to do the gathering. You are going to take the thread on the under side(the bobbin thread), Pull on the thread some and help move the fabric along.  Be careful you don't want to break the thread. Keep pulling until you have gone the entire length of the fabric.

I usually then just go back over it and make sure all the ruffles on the fabric look even.

And you are done, now we can attach it to whatever we want! YEAH! I love ruffles.