Another Christmas Bauble

My new Christmas bauble finally finished.

This Christmas bauble was started back in November in my local sewing group, the Georges Hall Sew'n'Sews. We had decided to cancel our December meeting due to the proximity of Christmas, and instead made our Christmas decorations in November.

This decoration is based on a polystyrene ball, available from places like Spotlight and Lincraft. It is divided into sections, cut with a stanley knife, then fabric is pushed into the cuts. I have made plenty of these over the years, so this year I took the basic idea to another level.

I first had to divide my polystyrene ball to obtain a pattern. From there I scanned my pattern into my digitising program to get the correct size to digitise my words. Once done, I could then play with the shapes of the letters to get them into the shape to fit the bauble.

My first attempt at stitching them out showed that I needed more of a border around the letters to accentuate them more, so back to the file I went to fix it up. Once fixed, I was happy with the stitch outs.

My ball is divided into six, three sections are my digitised words, and the alternate three sections are the same green fabric that has been over-layed with a red glittery mesh fabric. The ball has been finished of with red ribbon.

It's probably my favourite bauble on my tree this year, thought I do have other decorations that are not baubles that I like much better. Most of my tree decorations are hand made, this just adds another one to the mix.

Digitized Machine Embroidered Multihooped Scallops

Behold! My first project that involved multi hooping!

I have wanted to know about multi hooping for a while. What is multi hooping you ask? It is where a whole machine embroidery design has to be hooped more than once to achieve the final result. The trick is getting it to join smoothly and without the join being noticed.

Then one day I discovered a new canvas in my upgraded digitizing program. It was a hooping canvas. Previously, I had only had an artwork canvas and an embroidery canvas, now I had a hooping canvas as well. I decided to play, and the only thing to play with was a big design that needed multiple hoopings.

I had asked a lady I know who is very good at digitizing. All I knew was that there were registration points for matching purposes, but I didn't know how or where to put them.  The only clue that A---- had given me was to start small, and had suggested to start with a flower that need a long stem. Mmmmm.......... what would I put a flower on? So I go thinking, what else could I do that would need a long line, take little matching, and that  could be used if it worked? So my scallops were born.

I started looking through my files to see what scallops I had. I did have one, but it was too small for what I wanted, so I set about digitizing a bigger one. I was going to stitch them out onto white fabric, cut the excess fabric away then use them as a trim of a bag. Sort of like a lace trim inserted between two pieces of fabric. They didn't need to be too strong just for a trim, but I still wanted them strong. So there are two different underlays under the scallop, as well as interfacing ironed onto the fabric. Hopefully this will be strong enough so the scallops wont stretch, or tear at the points.

The program automatically made them with the stitch angle at 45 deg. This was not good so it needed to be changed. I put it at 90 deg,  It was fine at tip of the scallop, but  did not look good at the points. I had discovered an 'add stitch angles' button which I decided to play with. I am sure I had it before the upgrade, but had never used it. It came in good use now. I inserted multiple stitch angles into my scallops to be at 0 deg at the points, and 90 deg at the tip of the curve. This made the stitches curve beautifully around the scallop.

OK, so scallop done, it now needed to repeated so it stitched out in a smooth stitching sequence. Time to adjust start and end points before repeating. In all, I repeated the scallop so I had a line about 19 inches, that's nearly 50 cm in length. A length  that I could use, and definitely had to be multi hooped.

In the hooping canvas, I learnt how to position hoops, add hoops, add splitting guides and a lot more that in reality I didn't need. It certainly was a learning curve. According to the program, I had one splitting guide, and two hoopings, but when I came to stitch it out, the machine told me that the design was too big for the hoop. Mmmmm........ not according to the program. This is where I found out that I could change the hoop size, and when I put in the hoop size that I had on the machine, I now had three hoopings!

OK, so now I was about to start stitching out this design. I had searched on line for resources on multi hooping, and read tutorials and watched You-tube videos. One of the tutorials said to use sticky backed stabilizer. I had seen it, but never used it. Could I buy it? Yes I could, but I chose not to. Instead I used my trusty tear-away. Lesson leaned, not a good choice.

The program had split the file into three different parts. I had to stitch part 1, re-hoop, match up registration points, then stitch part 2. Part 1 had registration points in the stitch out, and I was supposed to match the registration points in Part 2 to those in Part 1. The problem was that because I had used a tear-away stabilizer, it tore at the registration points! I tried to match them up when stitching out Part 2, but of course I was out and things didn't match. Mmm....... lesson learnt. I was out by about 2 mm, not a huge amount, and my scallops overlapped so at least it was still usable.

When I came to stitch out Part 3, I didn't even use the registration points, I just moved the design on-screen and matched the start point of part 3 with the end point of Part 2. Perfection!

That's when I decided to stitch another line of scallops, the could be used on the other side of the bag. I have trimmed them now, and they are ready to trim my new bag.

OK, so my first try at multi-hooping was a huge lesson. I have learned heaps. Would I do it again? Absolutely! So watch this space for more multi hooping adventures and of course my finished bag trimmed with my own stitched out scallops.

Digitizing Fun

My first dragonfly I have digitized! It's also the first thing I have fully digitized in my new digitizing program, about three weeks worth of playing and learning.

It all started a few weeks back, when unbeknown to me, DH and DS2 decided to upgrade my PC to Windows 8. There was talk in the background about buying stuff, but it was computer stuff, and I wasn't really interested or taking much notice. Then one day just before Easter, DS2 started asking about my digitizing program, what it was and what version it was. Why the sudden interest? Mmmmmm........ it was not going to work on the new Windows 8 that they had ready to install on my PC! I had spent $$$$$ on this program, so it had to work! So I asked in at my local dealer, and of course the girls in there did not know, but they gave me the phone number for Bernina head office. I rang when I got home and got told that I had to talk to a particular person who was currently interstate at a quilt fair. They would pass on my details, and I was assured this person would ring me back. Come the next day, still no answer, so I rang again. I got to talk to another person who also told me that the person currently interstate was the best person to talk to. While I was on the phone to her, there was another call coming through. Guess who!

I had a great chat to this girl, who told me that an upgrade for my program to the latest version had just been released, and yes, she assured me it would work on Windows 8. There was still better news, it was on special for Mothers Day! The price was certainly good, about half the price quoted to me over 12 months previously for an upgrade to the previous version. I certainly was a happy little  vegemite! How did I get this? Ring my local dealer of course.

After many phone calls, and to cut a long story short, this upgrade was purchased, paid for, in my house and  installed on my PC by late that afternoon, without me having to leave the house! I give thanks to the girls at my local dealership (especially Anna), Bernina Australia, and  DS2 who made it all happen.

Now for the program itself. When it opened for the first time, I thought "what is this?". It looked all new. But once I sat down, read the manual, and spent some time playing, everything that I knew from my old program was still there, just in a slightly different format. There is heaps of other stuff that is new as well, stuff that I have yet to play with and learn. After playing for a little while, I thought that the only way to learn where everything was, was to actually digitize something. That's when my dragon fly was born.

Anyone who digitizes knows that the process takes some time. I wanted to get the stitch order right to eliminate too many colour changes, and avoid jump stitches that were too long. As I worked on all of this, I found all my stitch  fills, my "Cut Holes" tool, I created my own pattern fills, found the colour film, and the slow re-draw. All these things were what I was used to using, and  there is so much more!  There are contour fills now,  ( which I used on my dragonfly tail)   ripple fills, wave effects and star effects. I did use the wave effect on my dragon fly to get the ridges in his wings just where I wanted them. There is a stamping tool where I can stamp single patterns into a design just where I want them. I can also create my own stamps. There is a carving stamp ( which is different from a stamp) which I think will create sculptured fills, and yes, I can create my own. There is monogramming, stump work, morphing, and punch work, all things that are new to me. Last but not least there is a hooping canvas, where I can split a large design into numerous hoopings, allowing me to stitch it out so the sections meet back together to make one large design. This to me sounds scary, but something I have to try.

So my dragon fly is finally finished being digitized. The stitching order and colour order is correct to how I want them, and any jump stitches hopefully will be hidden under the body of the dragon fly and caught down. The next test will be to stitch him out, and that will hopefully happen in the next few days.

So what now? Playing with all the new features of course. My first play was with the monogramming tool. This is awesome! Would I put monograms on anything? Maybe, maybe not. My mind is racing to other applications, such as creating blocks for quilts minus the initials of course. Watch this space!

Flutterby Dreams

Well, what can I say, it's been a while! We might just skip over all the Seasons Greetings stuff (hoping everyone had a good one) as we are way past that now, and just get on with the creativity.

I have been creating, ( those that know me well know that I create something with textiles every day !), I have just been creating things that I couldn't show here for a while. Most of what I am creating at the moment are for the new little people arriving in the family.

This quilt was created for a new little girl that arrived in the family late last year. I knew she was arriving, but it still took me by surprise when I got a phone call to say she was due "next week". That sent me in a spin, what do I do? In the same phone call I was informed of another little person arriving later this year! I might add here that this phone call was the night before I was going on holidays, how could I think? My mind was in a spin. The phone call was from the mother of the baby expected later this year, so at least I could ask her what she wanted. Mmmmm..........anything. What colour? Mmmmm...........whatever you feel. I was after inspiration,  so I had to look elsewhere for that, and I was going on holiday, no time to look through my patterns and books! For the whole trip in the car ( I was passenger) my mind was thinking, I could do this, or that, no, little fingers get caught in the holes, this would be better. What design? My books are at home! Then I remembered about the two creative shops in the little town I was going to. One of these shops is a patchwork shop, selling a great range of fabrics, patterns and general sewing stuff. My kind of store! I would just have to go for a visit to see what inspiration I could pick up there.So visit I did, and came out with a bag full of fabric that said "baby". Then it was onto the other store for more inspiration, but there will be more about that in a later post.

OK, so I had fabric, now to a design. I would worry about that when I got home (or so I thought),. I had other stitching with me to do.

While we were away the message came about L____'s arrival. A little girl! Mmmmm....... I had lots of pink fabric............... and white................ mmmmmm...........enough for a quilt? There were lots of other colours in the bag too but this was a little girl, she needed pink and white. So the paper came out,  the designing started, then the calculations. Mmmmm.......... I would just have to go back to that lovely shop to buy more pink fabric!

The quilt needed to be done as fast as possible, after all, L_______ was already here. So just quick squares were the answer, but it was looking to plain, how to jazz it up to give it some oomph! Some machine embroidery! Butterflies for a little girl! That would be good.......and quick! Well relatively, considering Christmas was around the corner. But it would all have to wait till I got home.

Upon arriving home I set out to see what butterfly designs  I already had , after all it is the digitizing process that takes all the time. I found a few, but only one I thought was anywhere near suitable. The shape was nice, but the heavy stitching wasn't, it needed to be light and delicate. So I set about changing it. I took all the heavy stitching away from the wings and inserted a filling stitch, placed at an angle to give more interest. Then I set about changing all the start and end points of each component of the design. If they are in the wrong place, the stitch out will have nasty looking jump stitches that cause problems. As any digitizer will tell you, this may sound simple but in reality takes time, then it all has to be tested to make sure it works.

The butterfly above is what I came up with.

Once the design was tested, I then had to think about how to execute it to fabric. I could cut out all my squares ready for embroidery, but they wouldn't fit in my embroidery hoop, and would need calico stitched on all four sides to make them fit. Mmmmmm........................time consuming. So then I thought about marking the squares onto the fabric, and  positioning the embroidery design in the hoop to fit within each square before the fabric was cut. Much better, less sewing, less time. So all 33 butterflies were stitched onto the fabric before it was cut.

Once the butterflies were done, the cutting and piecing were quick. Then I just had to think about the quilting and that was a no brainer. I had set the design off center to add more interest, and added the quilting lines to reflect it. Just straight line quilting, nothing fancy, pink thread on pink fabric, white thread on white fabric. Quick and easy, followed by the binding.

The quilt is now being cuddled by it's new owner, hopefully for many years to come.

Shoes

It's that time again, time to get things ready for the sales table for my local EG group's exhibition. For the last two exhibitions, it has been my job to make shoe bags. Why me? Because I have one of those "fancy" machines. You might recognise some of the designs, they are the same ones that I used before.

In the  blue one above, I have used a variagated thread for the first time. It's not the first time I have used this thread, just the first time that I have used it in these kinds of designs. It was interesting to see the result & how the stitch angle can change the appearance more so with the use of a variagated thread.

These ones have been done with just plain threads. It is also interesting to note the differences that occur when using different fabrics, polycotton just doesn't sit nice no matter how much stabilizer I use.

This design is a new one. I wanted something funky that perhaps the younger trendy generation might like. It still needs some work on the digitizing side, but when that gets finished & the design is stitched in some bright colours on an even brighter fabric, I think it will look awesome. I am just gald I do not have to walk in those heels!

They all still need to be stitched up & finished ready for sale, but that is a walk in the park compared to the digitizing. Hopefully they will sell well.

The Hippo Quilt

My local sewing group is sewing for charity. This little hippo quilt is one of the many that are being made. The center features a cute little hippopotamus stitched in pinks, blues, mauves & black. It is a digitised design & has been stitched by another lady in the group. Other mebers have added scrap fabrics to the edges to turn this into a delightful little quilt.


For my part, I added the bind. I like stitching binds, especially creating the mitre in the corner.

A sick little girl should be happy to receive this.

For Charity

My local sewing group meets this week & one of the tasks I promised to do was to add some fabric to these cute little digitised animals. The blocks are to be a certain size so they can be cut down & patch-worked together with sashings. The end result will be a quilt to be donated to charity.

My sewing machine nearly had a fit this morning it has been so long. Poor girl has been neglected after all that wedding sewing I did a while back. Must get back into it & do my quilts that are hanging around.

An Exhibition

Those people who know me well know that I belong to a few different textile inspired groups, one of which is called "Stitcher's Plus". We are a group of creative minded stitchers, and have been meeting & stitching together for over ten years now. Recently, we put together a collection of our works into an exhibition. Below are the pieces that I had in this exhibition.

First up is a book cover. This was the piece of Reticella that I worked for our tenth anniversary calendar. The piece has been sitting for quite some time waiting to be made up into a finished piece. I needed a book cover, so a book cover it has become, & how fitting that it should be a cover for my lace journal.
Next is a piece of Teneriffe Lace that I inserted into a handkerchief. Inspired by pictures of teneriffe lace that I have seen on the internet, I have been playing with different designs using the technique. This was one design that I found, & had to work out the method by myself as there were no instructions. Not my design, but definately my stitching, and was great fun using the brain to work it all out. It was relativley easy once I thought about for a few minutes.

Piece three is my first piece of Reticella which I showed you all here. This piece has been in two other exhibitions, and will probably go in at least another one or two. I am extremely proud of this piece.

Piece four,"A Summer Sanctuary", has also been exhibited twice before. The challenge proceses involved can be read here.
Next is a bag that I made from a challenge we were handed invoving faces. The face has been created using applique & FME, then pieced into the front of the bag.

The back of the bag has been pieced using the Flying Geese pattern & the whole bag has been machine quilted. This face has become my internet face & anyone who knows me personally will tell you I look nothing like this. A bag I use a lot.


Then there was my scarf. Made with a daisy wheel using a fancy knitting yarn, then crocheted together. Very slinky & warm.

Finally, my "Bugs In Boxes". These were another challenge & both consist of a painted canvas backgrounds which have been threaded with various yarns . Both also consist of couched yarns for the tree branches & leaves made from hand dyed fabric that has been FME'd with a metalic thread. The caterpillars in the top one are stuffed rouleau tubes featuring surface stitching, while the butterfly on the second one has been digitized & stitched onto water soluble fabric.



The exhibition is now closed, but for some more pics please visit our Stitchers Plus pages.

Wild & Free"

This page was created for the book called "Wild Side". I felt it was a bit dark but wasn't sure how to lighten it up without starting all over again. I created a spiral design with the words "wild & free" & various sized paw prints in my drawing program, & imported it into my digitizing program. The design was stitched onto gold fbaric which was layered over a background created by joining strips of black & green fabric & digitized leaves. Once stitched, the excess gold fabric was cut away to reveal the background. All the layers were then added to another background of brown felt with added brown fabric leaves.

This is the last page in this book series. On reflection, it was great to go back through them all & see just how much I learnt. My main aim when entering this Book Page Round Robin was to learn about my digitizing program, but I learnt heaps about my drawing program & the power of photo editing programs, about layers & effects & merging two or more images together. I learnt not to be scared of computer programs, but to experiment & see what they could do. I also learnt not to be scared of FME, it was not as hard as I had always thought.

The pages have long since gone to their new owners, I hope they have as much fun looking at them as I had creating them.

Hexamorphis

"Hexamorphis" is the page I made for the book called "Metamorphose".

Beginning with drawing a hexagon in my drawing program, I changed it's shape just by playing with the nodes on the corners. The hexagon morphed into a star shape, and all kinds of other weird & wonderful 6 sided shapes. So these shapes became the basis of my design. Cut from hand dyed fabric, appliqued onto purple cotton, added machine stitching & all appliqued onto yellow felt.

Rainbow Lollipop

"Rainbow Lollipop" is the page that I made for the book called "Just For Fun".

"Just For Fun" is the catch cry for Luna Park, the fun park here in Sydney located just at the base of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, so this became my starting point. I thought of ferris wheels, lollipops & fairy floss, bright colours & noise.

The basic petal shape was drawn in my drawing program, then imported into my digitizing program to be played with again. Seperate files were made then combined into one before the final design was stitched onto a FME'd background.

Fragile Fragments

"Lace - A Frragile Textile" was my page that I created for the book "Fragile Fragments". Lace is my other passion, and though it appears fragile, if it is made correctly it is quite strong, and will outlast most fabrics that it is attached to.

For this page I chose a lace doily from my collection that I bought at an op shop. (The aim was to reproduce it one day) . I then scanned it, cropped it, added 3D effects, embossing effects & printed the final image onto seeded homespun. Digitized flowers, lines of stitching to reflect the shapes in the doiley, & stretched lettering were stitched into tulle which was then overlayed over the doiley image.

Earthsong

My "Sea Shell Whispers" page for the "Earthsong" book was once again inspired by water. I love water, & eveything it holds. Many holidays at the beach have resulted in a collection of shells, & if we hold them close to our ears we can hear the waves of the ocean.

For this page, my own digitized design of a shell was stitched onto tulle. It was then placed on a background of layered hand dyed fabric & organza which had been stitched with lettering & FME.

Flight

"Fly Ladybug Fly" was the page I made for the book called "Flight". My drawing of a ladybug was digitized and stitched to a background which I made by stamping painted leaves onto fabric.

All Creatures

This page, "The Pelican - My Forster Friend" was created for a book titled "All Creatures". I love pelicans, & photograph them quite often, especially along the Mid north Coast of NSW. This page was inspired by one of those photographs. The background was created using layers of blue polycotton & organza, using FME to hold them together. Some sections of the organza was cut away to give a different texture. The pelican itself was sketched, digitized, & stitched onto the background.

Hundertwasser

When I received the title of this book to create a page for, I was in a dilemma. I had not even heard this name so had to do lots of research. In the process I learnt about the artist Hundertwasser, his life & his works. Not really my cup of tea, but the challenge was real & I still had to make a book page.

I started by cutting small pieces of fabric & ironing them onto vylene. Machine stitching was added, followed by strips of the same fabric also machine stitched in place.

The spiral shape was drawn in my computer drawing program, imported into my digitzing program, digitized & finally stitched onto the created background. The angled shapes were also computer drawn & digitized, but stitched onto another pieced background, which in turn was appliqued onto the main page. The final page was finished with a twisted cord made from fancy knitting yarns.

Colour & Shade

This was the page that I created for a book called "Colour & Shade". Corrugated cardboard pages were provided for us to use, & I seem to remember there were various colours to choose from.

I used a frangipanni shape, overlapped, traced the outline, then mirror imaged. The lines were then digitized. Purple satin was overlayed with hand dyed cotton, the lines stitched, fabric cut away, then more layering with net, more stitching & more cutting away. The final touch were the buttons stitched on with beads, all over yellow felt.

I know I had trouble with this page, everything was always dull. I think I was trying to keep the "shade " part going with the use of shades of purple & it wasn't quite working. Hence the introduction of yellow. Much better.

Another Time Another Place

Now for the pages that I created for this book RR.


This one was for a book titled "Another Time Another Place, " and my inspiration was water & the coastline. I love the coast, & hope to retire there some time in the future. So the coast was my "other place" & retirement my "other time".

I started with a postcard of the Great Barrier Reef, scanned, cropped, manipulated, then printed onto textile transfer paper & ironed onto white cotton fabric. The flowers were made by trapping threads in between two layers of sheer fabric, then machine stitching in the flower shape to trap the threads. The "Sun, Surf & Sand" has been digitized.

I was proud of this page & it was like nothing I had ever done before. It was my first attempt at using the transfer paper & I learnt lots about editing needle points in my digitizing software.

Loopy Lace Page 13

Made by Dale Rollerson, a background has been created using black felt gilded with gold foil. The letters were digitized, then stitched onto black felt, burnt out, then applied to the background. Other small digitized lace motifs were stitched & applied, then all were covered with a layer of "lace". This lace layer was made by using a fancy machine stitch on Water Soluble Fabric.

This was the last page that I received for my "Loopy Lace " book. It's been nice to go back over them all again after so long. Now stay tuned to see the pages that I made during this Round Robin. There were 16 in all, counting this first page of my own book.

Loopy Lace Page 11

Page 11 is by Anita Jenkins. Digitizing software was used to create the gold patterns which were then stitched on to felt & later burnt with a heat gun to produce the lace effect. The border was created using FME over threads sandwiched between two layes of water soluble fabric