A Lettuce Edge With Your Sewing Machine

What is a lettuce edge?
We've all seen cute girly tops and dresses (sometimes even knit pants) with wavy hem or sleeve edges. This is called a lettuce edge, and you can do it with your regular sewing machine. No serger required.

The other night I sewed up this little top for my 6yr old for "pink" day. Yeah she has pink in her closet. For some reason when you have a mom that sews, asking her to sew you a new shirt the night before an event at school seems like a reasonable request (or at least she thinks so).

"But Mom, I don't want to look the same as everyone else."
(You see I had tried to talk her into a plain pink shirt already in the closet).
"You think I should wear a plain shirt?!"
(The audacity)

Ok, I'll make you a new shirt. Geesh.

A lettuce edge is great for when you accidentally cut the hem or sleeves shorter than you meant to (which was the case here). I didn't have the length needed for a traditional hem, so instead of giving this to the 5 yr old and having to make another shirt. Lettuce edge it was! :)

Now, just like shirring, every machine is different. What I do on my machine may not work for you. So, just like shirring, practice on a scrap piece of fabric until you get your settings right. A couple of things you will want to do is set your machine to a zig zag stitch, and set your machine to the narrowest zig zag possible. Just like you would do if you were wanting to produce a blanket stitch on an applique.
Then, you will want to play with your stitch width. I like mine fairly wide and prefer more substantial stitching on my edge.

To create the "lettuce" look to the edge you need to stretch your fabric. You have to use fabric that stretches. If your fabric doesn't have a good amount of stretch to it, forget about a lettuce edge. It isn't going to work. Cotton/lycra is perfect!
Now, you need to stretch from both sides of the fabric. When I say both sides, I mean in front of the presser foot as well as behind. You can't do this with one hand, I'm just using one hand in the photo as I needed my other to take the picture.
I use my left to pull behind the presser foot and my right to pull in front. You want to stretch the fabric as much as you possibly can while sewing and gently guiding the fabric through your machine.

See when you release the fabric after it is sewn, the nice ruffly edge it creates?
If you go around the hem once and find there are gaps between the stitches (which can happen if you aren't patient and are pulling your fabric through your machine), just continue to stretch the fabric and go around a second time over top of your previous stitches to fill in the gaps. Just remember to keep stretching even on the 2nd time around.

Lots of times I use embroidery thread to give the edge a bit of a shiny sheen. Regular thread is fine too though!
I like lettuce edges, they are so cute and girly and easy!

Now, go and clean out your machine! Doing this tends to create a lot of lint in my machine.

On an unrelated note, I purchased a few of these really cute embroidered applique patches from Holland Fabrics. Do any of you know where I could find a large selection of these?
I have an embroidery machine, but these are just so cute and fast to use (I like easy). I would love to find some more cute ones! :)


Pattern is my "go to" T shirt pattern- Farbenmix Antonia