Beginner Sewing Tips

Some of my first memories are of me sitting in front of my mom's sewing machine learning to use it at, maybe, age four.
Here's a couple tips that should help beginners:

1)Take sheets of ruled notebook paper and practice sewing while following the lines (no thread in the machine). Until you master this skill there's no way you can hope to do top-stitching and have it look good.

2)BEFORE you buy any sewing pattern, ask the shop clerk for permission to read the pattern instructions. Trust me on this: If you can't understand what's going on in the instructions at the store, you won't understand them at home either and you will have wasted your money on a pattern you can't use or you will have ruined an expensive piece of material.
The Fix:
Look around for a simpler pattern or a pattern which has easier to understand intructions.

3)So now you've bought your pattern and you understand the instructions, what's next?

You have to check the pattern fit against your real world body dimensions. One easy way to do this is to take a ready-made garment that currently fits you well and measure it---a shirt for example.
I like to measure the shoulder length (neck to beginning of armhole), the back length, The armhole scyre, and then I like to measure the back width in several places from top to bottom.
One important pair of measurements are in the sleeves:
Since I have muscular upper arms I have to check to make sure the upper sleeve is big enough not to be tight.
The other measurement I have to check on the pattern itself: If there's more than say three inches difference in height of the top of the armhole scyre and its bottom, I have to adjust the pattern by spreading it out so that it flattens. If I don't do this, any shirt, blouse, jacket or dress that I make by this pattern will pull itself up everytime I raise my arms--and that's aggravating!

4) Make your changes to your pattern and get the pattern cut out and ready to use BEFORE you go near your material. Iron the pattern pieces smooth.

5) Wash and dry the material the way you plan on doing from here on.
If it needs ironing or a bit of light starch put on it--you want to do that first before you cut the material.

6) Before you get started actually doing any material laying out/cutting, take one last look at your notions list. Do you have everything you need: Matching thread, zipper, correct type of interfacing, buttons, pins, marking pens, machine needles, good light, extension cord for the sewing machine and another for the iron...?

7) Notice I said "iron" in #6?
You will need to iron every seam open after you sew it and before you sew another seam to it. The best and quickest way to handle this is to have the ironing board and iron set up and ready to go just before you begin sewing.
Sew several seams, then take a couple minutes and press them. Go back and forth.

8) Never sew when you are tired mentally or you are upset about something. You will find yourself making stupid mistakes.
Go clean out a closet or take a bubble bath instead.

:)

If one is daring or perhaps engineeringly-inclined, some SCA-type sewing is a gr5eat learning experience. I'm thinking of stuff lie Viking apron-dresses and "Greenland" gowns. It's all straight seams, many on the straight grain, and pretty straightforward to lay out the cutting; the only curved part of the greenland is the neckline.

Either approach is even easier if you just make the skirt, and make a casing at the top and run elastic through it for an easy and comfortable skirt that will fit both when one is thinner and when one is somewhat bloated. :)

one tip- in any kind of skirt, try it on before you hem it and get someone to mark all the way around at a fixed distance from the floor. Big butts or big stomachs can make the hem uneven, and that does not look very good.

I alomst always machine-hem, after overcasting (by machine!) the trimmed bottom edge. it looks fine and is lots easier.