I have three pairs of pinking shears. Two of them went on early retirement and I am hoping the third pair would not suffer the same fate.
When I was learning how to sew, my coach taught me to place the sewing pattern on the fabric, pin them together and to cut straight through the paper and fabric. It worked in class as they had shears sharpener there. With my first pair of pinking shears, I was totally ignorant of the fact that it should only be used on fabric. When it became blunt, I tried to look for a sharpener but the attempt was futile. I couldn’t find them anywhere.
So, I bought my second pair of pinking shears early this year, this time keeping it away from anything non-fabric and stuck a purple sticker on the first so I could tell them apart and use the latter for cutting anything not meant for the new pair.
To my dismay, the second pair became even more blunt than the first. I think it got really bad after cutting through the denim, cotton twill and home decor fabrics I used for my projects. I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to use it on thick fabric either. At ikea, I found a knife sharpener (the black gadget below) and tried it on my second pair. At first, I thought my problems were solved as it seemed to have worked but now it does nothing to improve the performance of the scissors. Nothing at all!
I searched the web and according to eHow.com, there are two ways of sharpening the pinking shears at home.
1) Fold a large piece of tin foil into multiple layers. Cut repeatedly through the foil, using the entire length of the blades. This will temporarily sharpen the shears.
2) Cut a sheet of sandpaper. Using the entire blades, not just the tips, make numerous long cuts. The sandpaper grain must be extra fine, or it will cause further damage.
Has anyone tried these and do they actually work? Please, please, please, help me by letting me know how you keep your pinking shears in tip-top condition? Even better, please let me know how I can resurrect the blunt ones. I really hope they can work again.
It is so frustrating to cut with blunt shears. Out of desperation, I bought my third pair (hopefully final pair) last Friday. It’s the silver one to the right hand corner. It is staying away from anything non-fabric, any medium weight fabric and the knife sharpener for sure! The question is, what then do I use for cutting medium or heavy weight fabric? I still wanna work with them…hmm…
Anyway, my silver shears came in handy yesterday as I starting cutting the pieces for my first macaron dress. I’ve learnt my lesson and this time I used my first pair of pinking shears to cut the tissue pattern out before pinning the pieces on the fabric. I’ve stitched the top portion today and would be working on the rest tomorrow. I did a fit of the top and I must say Colette pattern was super serious when it mentioned that there is very little ease in its pattern compared to commercial patterns. I’m crossing my fingers that it fits well.
More importantly, I would have to sew my first invisible zipper and am actually quite nervous about that too! Tips are welcomed!
I’ve just come around to invisible zippers too and I used the tutorial on Sew Serendipity. It worked really well!
I would recommend doing a practice zipper first. I just did my first invisible zipper and I was nervous I would ruin my skirt so I did it first on some scraps of the fabric I used for the garment. It helped me work out all the bugs before I put it in my skirt. As far a shears go no matter how careful you are they are going to get dull. I take mine to a Bernina dealer that sharpens them for a couple of dollars. I would call around and find a fabric store or sewing machine dealer that sharpens while you wait. Good luck.
Your dress is going to be so pretty! I love invisible zippers, because you don’t have to baste. I recommend not trying without an invisible zipper foot. Here is my trick: I baste the entire seam together, and then iron that seam open. I remove the basting, and then when I go to sew my zipper, I just sew the zipper teeth right where the crease is left from the seam – it gets the perfect width without measuring! I hope that helps you – I can’t help with the pinking shears, mine always go dull too. I did loosen the screw on my Fiskars and that helped a little (mine were hard to open and close as well.) I’ve heard the foil trick doesn’t work. Maybe they just aren’t made well anymore?
I totally thought that pinking shears were the ones that had the little grooves in them? And I have no idea how to keep my shears sharp. My husband thinks I’m crazy for having like 5 pairs of shears for different things and I would freak out if he wanted to cut paper with my fabric pair.
I followed a tutorial on youtube for inserting invisible zippers- it really wasn’t too hard, but it took a couple tries since the first few times they weren’t really “invisible” haha! The one tip I can give is that I thought it was easier when I was pulling my fabric at an angle when inserting the zipper so it could be as close to the teeth as possible. When I fed the fabric straight through, it wouldn’t be as close to the edge.
The pink ones are not pinking shears, just ‘shears’ or scissors. GoTo : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinking_shears to see the diff.
The third pair of scissors you purchased look like they are Ginghers, which is a good brand and should keep their edge for a while if you only use them to cut fabric. Save the box they came in, and you can send them back to the company to be sharpened and aligned. I have several different models and they are always what I always use to cut fabric. There are other brands that look similar, but hold their edge as long.
The pink ones are probably Fiskars of a similar brand. They are good for trimming pattern paper or, if they have a rounded point, let your child use them to cut up paper. They are usually inexpensive, so I use mine for anything and everything.
I think many fabric stores offer a sharpening service for scissors and shears.
Oh I see! Thanks for letting me know the difference:)
Thanks Kimmie! You are right, it was a wrong assumption on my part. I will check out youtube as well and give it a few tries before inserting. Thanks for the tips!
Oh, thanks so much stitchywitch and I really appreciate the zipper tips. I will keep your advise in mind!
Thanks Kate! Will do some practice till I’m more confident. I checked with Spotlight here, where I purchased the shears but they do not have a sharpening service. Will continue to try but there aren’t any other major fabric/notion stores around unfortunately.
Thanks! I will be doing a few practice rounds and if the zipper foot I got doesn’t work, I will definitely try this.
Hi May, unfortunately, not the ones I’ve checked here. I am thinking of checking with one of those key making/ shoe mending stores to see if they do since it sounds impossible to do them well at home. Thanks for the suggestion:)
Try a tool sharpening place. I took my pinking shears to the same place we take our ax & lawn mower blade…..they did a great job and it was very affordable!
Thanks for the info. I’ll check where they might have this service.