When I purchased my sewing machine, I made sure the machine could do everything I might want to do and a bit more. Three or more weeks later, I discover yet another facet to my sewing machine's deep nature . . . it makes lace! When I was browsing for embroidery patterns to download, I kept running across some that were prefaced with FSL and wondered what that meant but put it to the back of my mind as I was on a quest for a particular design and all the ones shown with FSL didn't appeal to me. The reason they didn't appeal to me is that they were too delicate and didn't seem to be workable for my needs and, besides, I still didn't know what FSL meant.
I finally discovered what FSL meant and you can see the results in the picture - Free Standing Lace. You can actually make lace on the sewing machine. I'm practicing on something doable like bookmarks. The way it works, is that you purchase something that pretty much looks and feels like heavy plastic wrap. Instead of putting fabric in your embroidery hoop for the sewing machine, you use this stuff. Then, with ordinary embroidery thread, you make the FSL pattern of your choice. When it is completed, cut away the excess 'plastic wrap' and then rinse off the newly-made bookmark with warm water to dissolve the product between the smaller holes and designs of the project.
It wasn't an easy start as it took some time finding the sewing machine needle that would cope with this without breaking the thread. I tried eight bookmarks and ended up with the ones shown - not too bad an average! I'm still amazed to hold a piece of lacework in my hands and know it is nothing but thread!
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