Ever Played Thread Chicken?
 

While looking for a particular pattern on YouTube, I came across the mention of the game of "Thread Chicken". The gal on Pin, Cut, Sew Studio mentioned it as being when you are running out of thread and only have one seam remaining. If you keep sewing, who wins, you or the thread? I recently unwittingly played and I finished my seam with less than 1/4" left. Most of the time, I run out. How do you do?

If you mean bobbin thread, I don't know how much is left until it's all gone. Usually by then I've sewn another 4 feet with an empty bobbin.

Oh, yes!

Sometimes I even take the bobbin out to estimate how much thread is left.

Sometimes I win - !

Yes, it's hilarious, if my husband is home I go find him and show him how close I came to running out. He just looks at me and rolls his eyes.

Who among us has not! Vintage machines do not have a warning feature, but after a few inches of sewing with no bobbin thread, something seems wrong. So, then I discover the problem!

I play chicken thread all the time. My machine alerts me when the bobbin is getting low but then I keep sewing hopefully to the end of the row or maybe even a couple rows until I run out or I'm at the end of the row and figure I've played well. Last time not so good as I lost, it was a very long seam but I got over halfway thru the seam.

Oh yes, many times. My Pfaff has a warning but one can go quite a distance before the thread actually runs out. My Janome does not have a warning but I can hear a difference in the the sewing sound when the thread is gone. Unless of course, I have my headphones on, listening to an audio book. Then it becomes an unpleasant surprise.

I am so proud of myself when I win with just a couple inches left in the bobbin (when I am lucky)

Have I played bobbin chicken?? Heck yeah.

I play it with two of my machines. My Bernina 590 just stops and won't stitch