Pompom-Trimmed Cowl

Here's a link to the cowl I had in mind to make:

Pompom-Trimmed Cowl. The link is to the great tutorial.


In my sewing room, this is not a good sign (but it's a great tip):

Damp sponge with little threads

I use a dampened sponge to "catch" or hold threads when the air is dry. The threads would rather stick to the damp sponge than to my fingers.

I wanted to make the cowl right away, so instead of ordering the trim from Purl Soho, I bought the size of black pompom trim that was available at Joann's. It's larger than the trim used in the tutorial, so I adjusted the width of the double fold from 3/4 in. to 1-1/4 in. to accommodate the larger trim. Because I'm so smart and can figure everything out.

I marked and pressed my fabric:

I used a denim size 100 needle because the border of the trim, which is stitched through, is quite dense, in addition to the multiple layers of fabric. Oh yes, all figured out.

Just fine until the tutorial didn't happen to take into account one of my little sewing quirks: I like to stitch from the right side of the fabric whenever possible. It usually results in a nicer finished look. In this project, however, after I sewed the pompom trim close to the edge of the double-folded edge, with the fold wrapped to encase the trim, it looked like this:

So I took out the stitching (see sponge at top), pressed the fabric again, and started over. I decided that one more row of stitching wouldn't hurt anything, and so, on to Plan B. I sewed the trim to the folded fabric, needle position far left, and sewed from the wrong side of the fabric.

Then I folded the fabric over, shown here to the left of the presser foot, to completely encase the trim. And, using my zipper foot, sewing through all layers, stitched the trim to the fabric again, this time with the needle in the far right position, close to the pompoms, again on the wrong side of the fabric.

I then sewed the third row of stitching through all layers, this time with the needle position at far left.

Ta da! Success! I pressed the sewn edge. I then repeated my revised process on the other long edge of the fabric. I followed the rest of the tutorial at Purl Soho Tutorial.

Here's the finished cowl:

I wouldn't want it even 1 inch shorter. I just ordered more pompom trim to make a few more.

Update: Karendee asked what size pom poms I used for my cowl. Here's a photo:

Those are 1-in. yellow-on-green grid lines, so, including the edging, each pompom is about 1-1/4 in. At Joann's, the rolls of this fringe are marked 3/4 inch, and as you can see, each pompom is (almost) 3/4 in. in diameter.

Blessings and peace...