OK. I have a FW and the buttonhole attachments with templates, but not the eyelet one. So, (admitting stupidity here) what do you use the eyelet template for? This maybe should be a new thread, but I'm just curious. It looks small and I haven't seen many absolutely round button holes. ????

One use would be for making belts....or any strap that buckles. And decorative uses like to make eyes on an applique.

Learn something new every day!

Thanks to everyone, and thanks especially for the "search the 'sold' listings" tip. Can you believe that I've been using eBay since about 2001 and never knew about the search for sold items. Thanks again!

Now, as to the item in question. I had found two; one was priced $X, and the other was priced $X plus 105 dollars more. That was a cost spread for sure.

Before reading about the "search" function here, I decided to do what I've done in the past and usually with good luck. I submitted a "Best Offer" for what the item was worth to me. I wrote a polite note, hit submit, and knew the seller would "accept" the offer, or not, or laugh in my face!

I've learned that no matter how enticing an item can be, or how bad I "want" it, if I don't get it the first time, another one will come around. Or I'll stumble upon it in a thrift shop/yard sale/estate auction. Nothing, at least in my price ranges, is that rare! LOL

And guess what! The kind seller accepted my offer. I should have the little doo-dad next weekend.

I did check the "search sold" and I am happy with the outcome.

Interesting post! Glad you got your item.

Eyelets - openings for drawstrings, or anything else you want to thread a string through. I don't see them used all that often nowdays - but I remember using them a lot when I was sewing back in highschool - just addball stuff. But that was in the 70's, and there was a lot of "oddball" clothing in fashion back then!

Janey - the eyelet was sold separately for the Singer and Greist sets. If you got one in a "set", they did not come that way originally. However that is how I've gotten all of mine, in with other stuff.

I've seen the boxes for extra singer sets and eyelets, and plenty of assorted 4 set boxes for Greist (and others made by Greist), but I don't recall ever seeing the box for a Greist Eyelet buttonhole.

Thanks, Path94 and Macybaby for explaining how this is used. Makes sense!

Cathy, thanks for explaining the use of the eyelet template so well. I was thinking that my mother made a drawstring bag that used eyelets all the way around instead of a casing and threaded a shoestring for the closure but my memory isn't so good. I remember having to make a buttonhole/eyelet rather then leaving an opening in the seam.

I think there was another use for eyelets which was to put on the side where you would sew a button so that you could use a shank button with a special safety pin type thingamabob on the inside and then you could remove the buttons - frequently metal or special material - when the garment was cleaned, so you wouldn't ruin the buttons or the garment.

The pictures are of the template sets that are probably closer to vintage rather than antique.
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Janey - Neat people never make the exciting discoveries I do.

Thanks for the pictures Janey! I wonder how old those are - kind of think with them using the term "standard buttonholer" they may be later - like from the time pretty much all buttonholers were side clamp, which would have been after WW2 - when the companies making top clamp machines stopped making them (either out of business, or contracted with cheaper Japanese companies to make them).

I remember those removable buttons - usually really fancy ones. I wonder if the eyelet could be used for cufflinks, though I think they use a small buttonhole and not an eyelet opening.

It's also interesting how styles changed and the attachments changed with them. Like how the tucker was one of the most common very early attachments, as tucks were a common adornment to clothing of the time. And by the 30's- 40's, it was no longer part of the basic attachment sets, having been replaced by the edge stitcher and gather foot.

I have used the automatic eyelet stitch on my modern machine to "tie" a quilt. I wanted as minimal quilting as possible on a whole-cloth type quilt (I was using a neat Indian-style block printed tablecloth as a quilt top), so I found a flower in the print with a center just about the same size as my machine made eyelets and used that as my "tack" stitch everywhere that flower appeared in the print.

Not a conventional use, but it worked great!