Help with SID
 

My sid is really stich near the ditch, stich back and forth across the ditch, in and out of the ditch, there must be some trick to it. I've tried slowing down, maybe the size of the stitches has something to do with it. Who can help with some ideas. (from CA)

Well my SID is not perfect, specially when I'm tired. LOL
First, slow down until you get the hang of it. I have the SID foot on but I don't really follow
the guide. I prefer to follow the needle. It takes a little while getting used to it but I get
better results that way. Slow down even more when you cross a seam that's where it
tends to veer off. But don't worry too much about it...just have fun. Once the quilt is
washed you won't notice all those mistakes.

I recently was told that when seams are pressed to one side that you stitch on the other side (without the extra fabric). I was trying to stay exactly in the ditch but that's hard to do so try to stay just to the edge of the ditch on the side without the seam allowance. Does that make sense?

Use an open toe pressed foot so you can see where your nrrdlr is going and gently pull the seams apart stitch in the valley. When you release it the stitching will not show and yes slow down!

I use my walking foot, go a bit slower at first , lift the quilt in my lap to mimimize the drag ( this can pull it from side to side if there is one side weighing more), lean back in my chair , and gently guide holding the edges of the rolled quilt about a foot back from the machine. Once I get in the "groove" I can speed up. Took me a long time to learn to lean back back and let the feed dogs do the work .

I refuse to do SID because it drove me crazy!

What I do instead is a serpentine stitch over seams. Serpentine is a built-in decorative stitch on many machines; looks like an S. I adjust the stitch length and width on my machine to create an S shape that I like.

Because serpentine uses more thread than a straight stitch, I like to use Aurifil 50wt 2-ply. This thread is perfect because it creates very little lint, it's finer because it's 2-ply instead of the more standard 3-ply, and the bobbin can hold a lot more of it before the bobbin runs out.

The *huge* advantage over SID is that I can depress the foot pedal completely and merrily sew away on top of seams. The serpentine is *very* forgiving of minor deviations. I no longer have eyestrain and also have no emotional tension trying to achieve a "perfect" SID.

Plus, I like the soft effect the serpentine stitch gives to the quilting.

Don't know what kind of machine you have, but I have a foot with a metal guide right in the middle. I ', pretty sure it's an 'edge joining foot'. I just put the guide on the seam and go slowly. The guide rides along the slight ridge in the seam and keeps it straight.

I will be watching this....Sounds like my STDing.

Prism99, thank you for the tips. I will be checking out my machine closer and seeing if I have this stitch or not. No stress and eye strain sounds fabulous!!

Using invisible or clear thread makes mistakes less noticeable. :thumbup: