Then my idea of taking the same lenght of yarn wouldnt work. My thought was
to take the length, only pull it through half way, work the buttonhole
stitch to the left, finish off, the use the long lenght remaining at the
beginning of the stitching to work towards the right. Not a good idea if
half of it will knot and tangle tho, eh?
Diana

--
Queen of FAQs
Royal Peace Maker
http://photos.yahoo.com/lunamom44

"Valkyrie" wrote in message
news:1073372279.30624@yasure...
My grandmother taught me (at about the age of 4 when I first started to do
handwork) a little trick to keep the thread from tangling up.......other
than her "A long thread makes a lazy seamstress" mantra. When you cut the
length of thread you are going to be doing any needle work with you hold
it
by one end and then very lightly hold it between thumb and forefinger of
your other hand and then run them down the thread. Don't pinch, just so
you
can barely feel the thread between your thumb and finger. If you will do
this in each direction, top to bottom, then turn it over and do this in
the
other direction you feel that one way is smooth, the other will feel
rougher, or have a bit more friction. Always pull your thread(s) so that
it
pulls smoothly through the fabric. If you have it going through the fabric
in the direction of the rough feel it will tangle and do that twisty
spiral
thing. When ever I thread a needle for embroidery, needlepoint,
Hardanger,
etc. I still always hold the needle and do the thumb and finger test from
the needle to the end of the thread before I start sewing, it's just
second
nature to me now. If your thread is starting to twist up and knot it's
usually because you are sewing "against the grain" of the threads.

Val

"Sarah Dale" wrote in message
news
On Sun, 04 Jan 2004 20:43:41 +0000, Claude Davis wrote:
My wife loves to make make blankets from heavy fleece material. She
stitches
around all four sides with yarn for a border. In doing this, she pulls
the
entire 50 feet or so of yarn thru the first stitch, then thru 2nd,
etc.
I'm positive there must be some method of hand stitching a border that
doesn't require pulling all this yarn thru each stitch.
Am I right? Can anyone tell me how or where to find the right stitch?

Hi Claude,

MOst books I have read on embroidery / handwork recommend that your
thread should be a maximum of 18inches long, so as to avoid snarls,
tangles, and over wear on the thread.

I doubt if your wife is using the wrong stitch. What she needs to do is
use a *much* shorter thread in her needle. She will have to start and
finish off very frequently though - which is the down side, and I do
understand why she is using a longer thread.

The simplest solution would be to machine finish the blankets.

HTH, Sarah