Powerful stitch for making pouches, hidden / binding stitch tutorial

Have you ever find it amazing to see the beautiful odd shape pouches or stuff toys in the Japanese patchwork magazine or books.  And I am sure a lot of us will wonder how do they make it so neat and beautifully.  The secret is to use hidden stitch.  Running / hidden stitch is very powerful stitching technique for binding pieces with odd shape, and to close an opening too. 

If you are able to master this stitching technique, you will find that making crafts and bags will become more fun and challenging in the future. 

Here is some guideline for you.  Running stitch is basically consisting of even stitches which run back and forth between 2 pieces of fabric, without overlapping them.

The following steps are used to close an opening.  

Arrange your fabrics and secure them with some pins.

Put a knot at the end of your single thread, sew from the starting point of the opening.  

Then in the sequence of A, B, C, D,E,F as shown in the photos below.  The stitches need to be even so that it will cause any ugly stitch results when you pull the thread. 

All you need to do is to 'run' your needle between the 2 pieces of fabrics as shown in the photos below.

 After 'running' a few stitches, pull the thread to bind the fabrics together. 

So after you have done your running stitch, how do you hide thread then ?

 Towards the finishing, insert the needle between the two pieces of fabrics.

  

Then loop the thread counter clockwise over the needle and pull it through (picture below).

Then make a  knot at the thread.  

Insert the needle to the fabric again (at the ending point of the stitches), then pull the thread, when the knot, pull the thread slightly hard until you hear the 'tick sound', you will see the knot is hidden inside the fabric.  Cut off the remaining thread on the fabric.  Done!!!

Here is my latest project using the technique above, , a Carriage Pouch .   The carriage is not made from the spell of the fairy God mother from a pumpkin tough, it is made from the heart of Story Quilt.  Now it is rushing to send Cinderella to the ball now

This It is a present for my Japanese friend, Emi Miyase san ^v^.  I really have to thank her all those years, for her support and care.  Thank you, Emi chan.  I will be sending this pouch to you really soon ^v^

** Pattern will be available soon