About Hemstitching

Hemstitching is a type of decorated fabric that was popular in the 20's and 30's. The art has become more popular recently for edging baby blankets.
 
The hemstitched look is created with a special hemstitching machine. The machine I use was built in the 1920's. It's a singer hemstitching machine. The machine has 2 piercer (or spreaders as I call them) and 2 needles.

The way it works is the first piercer goes down and splits the threads of the fabric making a hole (note: it doesn't cut a hole in the fabric). Then the 2nd piercer widens the hole. The needles them move along the sides of the 2nd piercer stitching around the hole thereby holding the hole open.

You then take a crochet hook and crochet around the blanket thereby getting this kind of edged look.