Silly sewing habits

[LadyStitch]

As I was cutting out my latest project on the confernce room table at work I had a co-worker stop by and see what I was up to.  She gave me a funny look when , just before I made my first cut into the fabric, I made the sign of the cross with my sissors, then cut.  She asked why I did that.  It is something I started doing years ago because an old quilter told me that by doing that you are asking God to bless your hand, and your work.  I swear the times when I didn't do it, where the times I made a major sewing F'up when cutting out.

A girl in my costuming class had to be wearing this one pair of slippers when she sewed because she felt she could never get the treddle pressure right in any other shoes. Another would not touch a sewing item unless she has on her "sewing apron". Even when she would go to the loo, she would hang it on it's hook. Soon as she would return, on went the apron.  When stopped in the hall to fix a button, she would have to go to her locker, get her apron, and THEN sew it on. Her rational was that when she had her apron on she was "working", and when not on she was "normal". 

Do any of you have any habit/ rituals you do ?

[Magpie Flynn]

I talk to my sewing machine, the thread, fabric, etc trying to entice it to behave for me. Especially the finicky machine.

[DonaCatalina]

I have sewing needles in one pin cushion, generic straight pins in another, long hat pins in another and fine silk needles in another. I am unhappy if they get mixed up.

I am what you might call Abel retentive about my pins and needles.

[Rowan MacD]

  I color code pins according to the bead color on the top.  Makes it easier to find pins that will contrast the color of the fabric you are working with and avoid finding them after you try on the garment..
 I am serious about color sorting beads too, and I do that in natural light.  I freak when I find white in with the yellow, black with blue, etc. and I won't use them until I can verify the colors.  When my eyes get tired, or the light changes, I can't see similar colors that well.  After the pattern is finished and you see it in the sun, is not the time to find that you were using dark blue prism beads instead of black or dark green.    
 

[iain robb]

Well, I take off my shoes and socks, cover my feet completely in a thick coating of bacon grease, then ... oops, wait a minute, you said "silly sewing habits" ... oh my, this is embarrassing ... 

[Dinobabe]

I can't sew in shoes at all!  I have to FEEL the peddle.  I also talk to my machine and other accessories (and myself!).

[Lady Rosalind]

I also can't sew in shoes!

My "silly" habit is that I have to take off my glasses and get thisclose to the fabric to make good and sure that I am on the grain correctly when placing pattern pieces. Very OCD about this.

[Kate XXXXXX]

We have cascades of very bad jokes...  Especially fabric related puns.

[LadyStitch]

After I had a sewing needle taken out of foot (funny enoug how I got my ren name)  I always sew in shoes.  You are not allowed in my sewing room with out shoes. HOWEVER I actually prefer to sew in my ren mocasins/sandels.  I feel barefoot in them.

Oh and I too belive sewing machine's have personality.  We a Chucky, Snark, a lester in our wardrobe.   Chucky liked to chug along, but if you tried to turn him into a speed demon he would throw a fit.  Steady yet quick could get you everywhere on him.  Snark, depending on how your mood was that day would tell you how he would behave.  If you were in a bad mood, and slapped him around, raced him around, and talked mad to him.  He would start doing all kinds of snarky things to your fabric, fingers, and just freeze up.  I had Lester.  He worked great as you were doing what you were told to do.  If you wanted to do piping, you had to use a piping foot.  If you left it on to even something little. He wouldn't like it.  It had to be just what you were doing, otherwise he would grumble, never throw a fit like Snarky.
The other two machines I used a lot was ziggy (Our zig zag machine.  He still does the best satin stitches I have ever seen.)  and I worked with Granny.  She was a machine from the late 1950's that was simular to any old singer I had growning up (and learned to sew on)  Every body else wanted to chuck her in the bin, except me.  I could sew on her for hours and not a peep.  But once she got tired she would start to get cranky.  Once you went and got a cup of tea, and took a little break, you could come back to her and she would go for many more hours.  However if you cursed at her for being tired and cranky, she would do something to 'smack you on the nose' and wouldn't work for you  again for a long time.  I loved her.  

[DonaCatalina]

I can't sew in shoes at all!  I have to FEEL the peddle.  I also talk to my machine and other accessories (and myself!).

I love my Baby Lock automatic stop feature. No more peddlin' for me!

[gem]

This isn't silly, but along the same lines: Because we have a big canine family who ALWAYS go barefoot (I've tried talking to them about it, but what can you do?  ), my favorite everyday pins are long with very big, brightly colored heads (similar to these). SO much easier to find if they go flinging onto the floor! They're too long for some projects, though, so I have some shorter ones for projects where the long ones would bend. I also have glass head silk pins for when I'm working with finely-woven cottons and at the ironing board--but those babies are SHARP! I always end up sliced to ribbons when I work with them.

[Adriana Rose]

I put the pins that I pull as I go in my mouth, Then I forget that they are there once I started rolling them around in my mouth. How I did it I havent the slightest

[Syrilla]

I have to hand stitch my stitches backwards, read sew opposite than most people.  Don't know why, it just works for me.  (drove my sewing teachers insane)

[iain robb]

I don't know if this is silly or not, but I have to be able to actually picture what I'm going to do before I sew. I have to run through it in my head -- often, several times -- before I can sit down at the sewing machine. And if I can't "replay" the next step properly, I have to stop. Or at least, I should know well enough to stop. It's really a mess to try to take out French seams because you've finished them on the outside.

[Aiacha]

I can't sew in shoes at all!  I have to FEEL the peddle.  I also talk to my machine and other accessories (and myself!).

Ditto.  Even when just sitting down to sew one seam, I have to take my right shoe off.  One time, while sewing at a friend's house, I took one shoe off to sew, but I'm not taking both of my shoes off at her house, so the whole day sewing I walked around her house one shoe on one shoe off!