oversteeped asked about finishing seam allowances without a serger, and having seams come apart accidentally.
There are actually a few ways to finish seam allowances without a serger! I myself don’t own one, I could never get along with them. Before you do any of these, you obviously need to iron your seam allowances flat and make the seams look neat and pressed.
1. Straight stitch down the middle of your allowances and pink the edges. [I don’t like this method because trying to use pinking shears in a small space is awful.]
2. Use a zigzag stitch down the middle or the edges of the allowances – this sort of mimics the effect of a serger. You can also zigzag the allowances together, like you see on the insides of shirts sometimes. This is the way I usually do it, it’s the fastest and simplest way that I’ve found.
3. Roll the allowances under themselves – like a rolled hem – so that the raw edges are concealed, then topstitch along the fold. [I don’t know if I explained that very well, sorry!] The seams that run down the legs of your jeans look like this. Obviously this puts stitches on the outside of your garment, and most anime outfits don’t have a lot of extra/decorative seams, so you’ll have to consider if that’s what you want on your garment.
As far as your seams ripping on their own… I’m not sure what could be causing it. I’ve never had this problem myself. There are a few things I could think of. I’m sure you’re an experienced enough seamstress to know to backstitch the beginning and ends of your stitches. It could be your thread, maybe it isn’t good quality, or maybe it’s not made of the right stuff. I just went through my thread drawer and pretty much every thread I use is 100% polyester and I’ve never had problems with that. My guess is that it’s probably just your machine, and the quality of the stitches it produces. I would do some research into what people online say about the machine you have, and perhaps go over your stitches twice until you can get your machine fixed.
I hope that helps!
