My Janome DKS100 Stitch Bible ~ and how to make one for your machine!!!

Janome DKS100 Stitch Bible

Front Cover

Hey everyone, so if you follow me on YouTube or Instagram then you'll have seen that a couple of months ago I upgraded my sewing machine... I had a good, but fairly basic sewing machine, the Janome 4400, and as great as it is it wasn't ideal for me as my love for sewing grew... I wanted a computerised machine because I just knew it would make the whole sewing process easier for me, the speed control and the start/stop button are life changing features because it means I wouldn't have to use the foot pedal.

So I started searching for a new machine, I knew I wanted either another Janome machine or an Elna machine (Janome's sister company), and I was scrolling through Instagram one day and saw that the Janome UK account had shared a photo of the DKS100 machine, I was instantly intrigued so I went and investigated further and found out that it was the PERFECT machine for me! It has 100 stitches and 48 of them can also be done with the twin needle so in theory you've got 148 stitches, with the machine you get a chart of all the stitches printed in the manual and you also get a printed chart on a bit of plastic that you can clip to the machine, both are great but I found it hard to actually picture how some of the stitches would look so I decided to make a Stitch Bible. If you want to see my review of the DKS100 and a flick through of the Stitch Bible then I've added the video below, if you prefer to read about it and see photos of the pages then keep reading :). 

A Stitch Bible is basically a physical representation of the stitches so you can see how they'd really look on fabric, so I bought a metre of calico from my local fabric shop and cut it into pages that were 7.5" x 10", I then separated them into two piles because I wanted to double up the pages. I took one pile and started drawing lines for the stitches to go on, I left a gap of 1" at the top and bottom of each page, then I drew lines that were .5" apart to fill in the rest. My machine's maximum stitch width is 7mm which meant that by drawing the lines .5" apart I was able to line it up so the stitches sat comfortably in between the lines and even when a stitch was using the full 7mm width it meant it wouldn't go over the edge, so if you're planning to make your own Stitch Bible double check your machine's maximum stitch width first and adjust your line spacing accordingly. I drew my lines and stitch numbers on with a normal ballpoint pen to start with and when I has finished doing all the stitches I used fabric paint to go over them, however if you wanted to you could sew the lines in and if you're machine has an alphabet and numbers you could even use that to sew in the stitch numbers, it's completely up to you how you want to do it, I just did it this way because I didn't want to waste thread and my machine can't do numbers.

So once the lines were drawn I was ready to sew, I chose bright colours and spools that were nearly empty for the thread so it really shows up against the cream of the calico and it used up any bits of thread that wouldn't necessarily complete a project. Like I said earlier I doubled up the pages so they were more stable, if your machine has some seriously decorative stitches then you might even want to add some interfacing to the back of one of the pages of calico to stabilise it so it doesn't pull in and look pinched, mine does look a bit pinched in places but at the end of the day I didn't really want to add interfacing because this is just something for me, it isn't a show piece or a gift so I just figured I wouldn't use more materials on it than was necessary. You will also notice that I jumped from stitch 1 to stitch 7... that's purely because on my machine the first few stitches are just variations on the straight stitch so I didn't see the point in doing them :) that's the reason for any other missing stitches too! I also wanted to have a record of the different widths and lengths (density) of the zig zag stitch for future reference, so I broke up the line into sections and then when the needle hit that line I just upped either the stitch width or length depending on which one I was doing at the time.

With this machine you can also elongate the satin stitches (71-79) by up to 5x without losing any of the density of the stitch, I wanted all 5 elongations to be documented for each of those stitches too so I decided to use two lines for each of those and split the first one into thirds and the bottom one in half, so the top line has the elongation up to 3x then the bottom line has 4x and 5x. It was so interesting comparing the 1x to the 5x on a lot of these stitches because they can look so completely different, especially number 78!

As I was working through I realised that I hadn't taken into account the twin needle stitches in my original plan, I really wanted to include them in the Stitch Bible because they can and quite often do look very different to the normal single needle version of the stitch, so I made up a few more pages leaving a gap of 1" after the last stitch (00) so I could paint in the heading "Twin Needle". This machine has a great feature for this, it has a twin needle button, which when you press it, will mean you can ONLY select stitches that will work with a twin needle and it'll set up the stitch width so that the needle won't swing out too far and hit the needle plate. I used a different colour thread in each of the needles so I could see exactly what each one was doing and once again I was really surprised by some of them, because you're essentially doing the stitch twice it makes the stitch width smaller so both of them can fit in the 7mm space and I thought they wouldn't appear quite as detailed, turns out they are just as detailed just more delicate.

I was going to overlock the edges of the pages to stop them fraying but I changed my mind, I decided I wanted to use the DKS100 to make this from start to finish, so I used my Overcast foot C with stitch 9 to mock overlock the edges, it worked great and even though I will always use my Overlocker when dressmaking I can see the Overcast foot/stitch being handy for smaller projects like this.

For the cover I decided I wanted to draw my machine and just do some basic lettering etc, I used DecoArt Crafter's Acrylic and DecoArt Glamour Dust mixed with DecoArt Crafter's Acrylic Fabric Medium to do all the painting, the paint is great and the glitter is amazing, you don't need to do loads of coats of paint, in fact a few light coats is all you need because the coverage is pretty fantastic.

I decided to add 2 eyelets to the top of each page, I used the Prym 5mm silver eyelets and installed them using my Prym Love Vario Pliers. The thing I love about the Prym Pliers is that you can literally use them for everything from plastic snaps to jeans buttons, and you have to use very little effort to use them because they are ergonomic, the eyelets went in smoothly and they are so flush and honestly look perfect. I really struggled to decide how to keep the pages together, there are 9 pages of stitches and a cover and for obvious reasons I didn't want to risk losing any of them...  I was looking all over the place and I did come up with a range of ideas but nothing was perfect, I wanted something tough that could withstand me flicking through the pages but that was also flexible enough so I didn't risk them snapping or it being too difficult to just flick through the pages, so after an evening dedicated to searching the internet I ended up finding these locking stainless steel wire keyrings that were absolutely perfect for the job and this is the end result.

I am beyond pleased with how this turned out and I know that it will get plenty of use, I've already come up with at least 20 different projects in which I can use some of these decorative stitches. If your machine does more than just the basic stitches then I definitely recommend making yourself one of these, not only are they fantastic for future reference they are also brilliant for familiarising yourself with your machine! I also 110% recommend this machine to anyone looking to get an upgrade from a basic machine, it's great for so many things and I can't fault it at all!

REVIEW of the My Dressmaking Project Bible from Stationery Geek

REVIEW of the My Dressmaking Project Bible

Cheat Sheet at beginning of the book

Hey guys I’m here today with a quick-ish review of the Dressmaking Project Bible from Stationery Geek. I have a few products from Stationery Geek now and they are all a brilliant quality, I have their Crochet Project Bible, the Bloggers Bible, the Crochet Pencils, the lime green Wrap Around Pencil Case and now the Dressmaking Project Bible, and I have my eye on plenty more things on their website too! I have been using my Crochet Project Bible to keep track of some seriously intense projects, one of which is my Sophie’s Universe blanket which, if you don’t know, has over 100 rounds/rows and quite a few different coloured yarns to keep track of too, so I knew that the Dressmaking one would be amazing too, sometimes there’s just one too many things to try and keep everything straight in your head and to be honest with you that’s when mistakes will happen.

                      

                    Wish List and Dress Size Conversion Chart

You have a choice of two sizes, A4 or A5, mine is A5 which I personally prefer because it means I can just pop it in my bag and take it to the fabric store with me easily and it has more than enough writing room, however the A4 would be equally as good, especially if you have larger hand writing. You can choose between the standard cover which says, “My Dressmaking Project Bible” or a personalised one, so you could have your name on the cover in place of “My”. There is even a new option to have it printed in a dyslexia friendly way, you can read more about it HERE, but basically instead of printing on bright white paper they will print on cream OR if you would prefer a particular colour then all you have to do is drop them an email and tell them which colour it is you want, you could even ring them if you wanted to discuss it further. The paper is also slightly thicker than their standard paper so that the printing on the other side can’t show through. They have done the research to make their dyslexia friendly range really and truly work and I for one and beyond impressed with their effort and dedication, I have family and friends that are dyslexic and trying to find notebooks etc that work for them that are also fun looking has been pretty much impossible, so I really am grateful for this range.

Blank Project Page

In the book there’s space to record all the details for up to 50 projects and there are a few pages at the beginning with some useful info, there is measurement conversion charts, some abbreviations, a list of useful tools, a space for a wish list, a VERY hand women’s dress size conversion chart and LOADS of space for notes and doodles. When you get to the main part of the book each project has 2 pages dedicated to it, a page to keep all the information about the project including a space to write any washing instructions, pattern amendments etc and the other page is just grid paper which I’ve used to draw up a tension table, but you can use it for anything you can even tweak it depending on the project you’re doing. As you can see from the photos I decided to give the headings a pop of colour by colouring them in using my fineliner pens :) I like to use a lot of colour in my Project Bibles to keep them looking fun and interesting (one day I'll show you my crochet one!

Details for my Kingston Jacket

The only dressmaking project I’ve recorded in my book so far is my Kingston Jacket, I realised while making that how important keeping track of tension is when dressmaking, especially when it’s a project that’s using two different fabrics or threads, that’s why I used the grid paper to draw up a tension table as well as a very rough sketch of the finished jacket… I was using denim, jersey fabric, sew-all thread and top stitching thread so there was a lot to keep an eye on. Not everyone will need a tension table because I have seen that some machines have auto tension control, mine doesn’t so that’s why I drew the table. I have a sewing machine and an overlocker, so it was even more crucial and meant I also had to think about the differential feed which had different settings for both the denim and the jersey.

A very quick, rough sketch of my jacket and the Machine Settings Table

In short I absolutely love the Dressmaking Project Bible, before I had it I was using various notebooks and scraps of paper to keep track of everything, so this is great it keeps everything in one place and means I won’t lose any crucial bits of information, it also means if I ever want to remake a pattern I can go back to see if I had written any notes on it to make the second time easier. I wouldn’t hesitate to buy from Stationery Geek again, in fact I really want their Quilting Project Bible next!

If you use the following link then you'll get 10% off of your first order on the Stationery Geek website. (It's a referral link so I will get a £5 voucher to spend with them if you use it) 10% Off First Order

And this link will take you directly to the Dressmaking Project Bible! Dressmaking Project Bible