16 February, 2024

Wooly Whales: A sparkling review of Joe’s Toes Slipper Kit

2024-02-16T17:57:34-06:00Embroidery, Weaving, Felting & FIbers|2 Comments

Sometimes the random things that pop up in your Instagram feed turn out to be something awesome. I spotted this slipper kit from Joe’s Toes while I was randomly scrolling a few evenings ago. I had been looking for a new pair of slippers after some sheepskin ones I ordered last fall turned out to be really uncomfortable. A kit sounded like fun!

I picked out the turquoise and teal kit and the description said I could customize it, so I requested the dark teal color for the uppers and green thread instead of rainbow. I knew I wanted to embroider or add something to the tops of them, but I didn’t have a plan when I picked out the kit.

The kit comes with pre-punched wool felt pieces for the upper, three layers for the soles, and the thread for stitching them together. You can choose from several options for the bottom layer or outsole. I picked the felt with latex, which is great on my hardwood floors and so far it’s not slippery at all.

I decided that I needed to stitch something fun on the uppers and after a little brainstorm my mom suggested humpback whales, which sounded really fun! So I dug through my stash of wool/rayon felt scraps and picked out a turquoise and blue-grey (peacock and pewter from Benzie Design) and some size 8 perle cotton. Even though the felt slipper pieces are about 3/16th inch thick, they are super easy to stitch into. I drew the whales onto some freezer paper so I could cut out all the little details easily. I basted them onto the uppers with a little glue stick. Once I had stitched around the whales, I added a few transparent sequins to add some sparkly bubbles.

I read through all of the instructions to assemble the slipper pieces and they offer a video, but I didn’t feel like I needed it. They have a couple of clever little notches that help you line up everything. Although they suggest using a backstitch to put everything together, which I’m sure works great, I decided to go with a double running stitch because I thought it would be a little neater on both the top and bottom.

These were so much fun to stitch! The pre-punched holes make it really easy even though you are stitching through four thick layers. I couldn’t wait to try them on.

Overall, the kit was packaged nicely, the instructions are great, the materials are super nice, and it shipped fast. I loved that I could customize it to the colors I wanted. I am just delighted with the results!

7 August, 2023

Pattern Review: Itch to Stitch Santorini Tank

2023-08-07T12:47:53-05:00Fabric Reviews, Sewing & Design|1 Comment

It’s been about 5 years since I have sewed something just for myself, just for fun. That seems crazy to me, but I think the last one was a dress for my sister’s wedding. I do a lot of sewing for my business, so the machine has put in the miles, but the only things I have made have been basically business related.

I realized that I wanted to just spend a day sewing for me. So I went on a search for some fabric that was not something I had designed and was something a little special. I have had great luck ordering some Indian cotton fabrics on Etsy. I ordered several yards of block printed cotton from this shop. It’s lovely. Smooth, soft, washed beautifully. Exactly what I wanted for a blouse.

I was going to make a favorite tank pattern (Gemma by Made by Rae) which I have made several dozen of over the years, but I needed to do an adjustment to the pattern because my body just isn’t the same shape it was 10 years ago and I was just feeling like I wanted to sew and not do math. So I was doing a little searching and this pattern popped up in my feed and I had to try it.

The Santorini Tank by Itch to Stitch. So much to love: the interesting seam lines, the button detail on the side. The fact that this pattern comes in sizes 00-40 and 4 different cup sizes! I’ve made one other pattern by Itch to Stitch before and I loved it, so I was pretty sure it was going to be great.

It took me about 4 1/2 hours to tape the pattern pieces together, cut out and sew my first one. I chose a size 12, C cup based on measurements but I have decided that it has more ease than I prefer, so I will go down at least a size in the future. (I made two; you’ll see that later.) I found vintage shell buttons in my stash, which were perfect.

What I love:

  • It has a great way of stitching the armhole facings “burrito style” and a link to a blog post about how to do it if the instructions are confusing to you.
  • The finishing details were really thoughtful. No weird raw edges on the inside.
  • Great instructions with lots of links to extra help.
  • The fit/shape is awesome.

My adaptations:

  • The pattern calls for 5 – 1/2 inch buttons which felt like not enough to me. I did 7 and they were slightly larger.
  • My sewing machine had issues stitching the two buttonholes right at the top because of the extra/varying thickness of fabric there. Not the fault of the pattern, but I might think about how I could tweak that construction a little bit so I don’t need to seam rip buttonholes out. (Argh!)
  • Eleventy-one pins really does make all the difference in making a curved hem lay nice and flat. I used the hemming method from the Gemma Tank which I mentioned up above, because I have had success with that before.

And then I made another one!

I also had a piece of Atelier Brunette Viscose Crepe which I got from Wyldwood Creative. She “unboxed” it live on Instagram and I ordered it that day. I love this vintage style print and texture. See a photo below. The one I chose is Lucie Cedar (green); she also has it in a blue and a gold/peach color. I had never seen this fabric in person before so I felt like this was a little leap of faith and I was absolutely rewarded! It is so gorgeous.

I decided to take another chance and I threw the fabric in the washer and dryer when it got here. Spoiler alert: that is not what the washing instructions tell you to do. But if I am making a garment, I will need to wash it and it’s going to end up in the laundry at some point no matter how carefully I try to remember to pull it out for special treatment. That’s just how it works at my house. I lucked out. It came out great with my not-following-the-instructions treatment.

For this one, I didn’t have enough fabric to do the button band and I decided with this very drapey fabric and busy print that it wouldn’t be a good match anyway. But I loved the way this pattern went together, so I just decided to make up another one and sew up the side seam, skipping the buttons. I could slip the other version on over my head without unbuttoning, so I didn’t need to invent another kind of closure.

The first version I made was too large in the bust for me and so I took it in as I was fitting/stitching. Instead of doing that again for this one, I reprinted the pattern and went down a size, so this is a size 10 C cup. I took about an inch in on either side on the previous version, so I just looked for a new size combo that was that much smaller. I loved how I could look at the chart of all of the combos of garment size measurements and find exactly what I needed. Ultimately, I chose to size down overall vs changing to a B vs a C cup (which also could have worked).

This one is close to a perfect fit. The bust still feels like it gapes a little at the underarms so if I do another, I might just swap out the B cup pieces but stick with this size and see if that makes it just right for me. Otherwise it’s just a little pattern tweak.

This is my favorite kind of top with some skinny jeans and a light cardigan when the weather gets cooler. So I can see myself making many more in this style and using some of my Spoonflower fabrics. With the button detail I think I would choose lawn or sateen. Without the buttons, poly crepe de chine would be very similar to this viscose crepe.

26 June, 2023

My Favorite Hand-Embroidery Threads: Eleganza Perle Cotton & Kreinik Very Fine Braid

2023-06-26T18:42:27-05:00Classes & Teaching, Embroidery|2 Comments

I’ve been teaching a weekly online embroidery class for more than a year now and although my regular students know my favorite threads, I thought it would be great to talk a little more about them outside of class. I do a LOT of hand embroidery on both paper and fabric so I use threads nearly every day. I just finished a large project using all 6-stranded DMC floss, which is probably the kind of thread that most people are familiar with, but it turns out that it’s not my favorite one. So, let me tell you about the ones that are my favorites.

Eleganza Perle Cotton

The threads shown on the left side above are all #8 Eleganza Perle Cotton made by Wonderfil. They have had artist Sue Spargo design a line of colors for them and these are my absolute favorite threads to stitch with. Perle cotton is a little different than 6-stranded embroidery floss. Instead of 6 strands, perle cotton has only 2 and they are meant to stay twisted together; you don’t separate them like you can with floss. The threads are incredibly smooth and shiny and I don’t think they knot up as easily when you stitch them. The variegated colors are particularly nice because the color changes are pretty close together, so when you stitch the color changes often and you don’t get long stretches of the same color. There are also some unusual color combos in the variegated threads, like this one called “Conga Line” which I like when I am stitching.

Pictured are Welsh Poppy EZ16 (orange), Paradise Blue EZ10 (blue), Conga Line EZM47 (variegated), Mounted Trousers EZ57 (deep green).

Kreinik #4 Very Fine Braid

I have tried so many different metallic threads over the years and they are always stiff, rough and fray easily. They are difficult to stitch with and some stitches just look ugly because of the stiffness of the threads. The Kreinik braids are completely different. They are still a little more challenging than perle cotton, but the #4 Very Fine Braid is much smoother and easier to stitch with. They are sturdy and they don’t leave your piece feeling rough and scratchy. The threads are very sparkly and come in so many colors. It’s not just silver, gold, red and green! I usually get mine on Etsy because Kreinik doesn’t sell directly from their website, but it’s pretty easy to find.

Pictured above are Gold 002, Vintage Burgundy 153V and Aquamarine 684. “Golden” Mrs. Santa shown below is from a pattern by mmmcrafts, stitched by me.

21 October, 2021

Designing Kits (and classes) behind the scenes

2021-10-21T12:46:10-05:00Classes & Teaching, Embroidery, Etsy, Sewing & Design|1 Comment

I LOVE making kits. I like designing small projects and sourcing beautiful materials. I even love the meditative afternoon of packaging things all up. It goes along with my love of teaching. For me, a kit is like a “class in a box” that you can jump into at any time. Instead of talking and demonstrating, I have the creative challenge of figuring out how to capture the important steps in photos and how to write the instructions to make them as simple and straightforward as possible. It’s a different kind of teaching, but for me it’s just as much fun.

This week has been all about cats. The cats design started as a request from students in a class that I taught with a bead embroidered dog. That dog is something I designed for a virtual class with the local county library, but then I loved it so much, I also turned it into a kit. Students in that class said “You should do cats!” and so I thought it would be fun to talk about how I designed those cats.

I always start with a sketch on paper and in this case since I already had the dog design, I wanted to make the two go together and share a similar style. So I started with my dog pattern pieces and sketched cat shapes over top of them.

My first version was too big, but I liked the shape. My next step is to re-draw the pattern pieces in Illustrator, so I made myself a note to reduce the size. That’s super easy to do once it’s in a digital format. I scanned the paper pieces and traced over them to create the pattern outlines. Then I printed out versions at a couple of different sizes so I could check it next to the dog and make sure I liked the way they worked together.

Next I started working on their faces and the embroidery. The first version, I tried to make curved eyebrows like the dog design has, but it made the cats look really angry. So I made another sample and decided to try and do tabby cat stripes instead. I liked this one a lot better. At this point in the design process, I make a lot of samples. Often if I can see they just aren’t right, I cut them apart and reuse pieces like the nose beads for the next version. I often use scrap felt so sometimes the colors are a little wacky. The beads I used here as a stand in for the nose were a little too big and square. My dog design used black sequins and black beads for the nose, but the cats looked wrong with the dark contrast. (My black and white version looked more like a skunk than a cat!)

So I swapped gold sequins for the black and found the perfect pinkish stone beads for noses. Next is choosing felt colors for the finished cats. I know that people love to make things that look like their own pet. I absolutely do. That’s why the dog kits have yellow, chocolate or black lab versions. So for the cats, I wanted three different colors too. These are loosely based on my sister’s three cats: a grey tabby, an orange tabby and a tuxedo (hers is all black). I get all of my felt from an Etsy seller because I love to support other small businesses with my small business whenever possible. So I have a color card with all of the colors of felt she carries and I spent a lot of time picking just the right colors for these. The orange tabby was definitely the hardest color choice to make. It is a darker color than the orange tabby I had when I was growing up, but it turns out that there aren’t a lot of shades of nice orange felt available. I like this combo.

Next I make up the “final” samples that I will use for the kits and then I make up one more where I photograph each step as I go so I can write the instructions.

I like to give lots of options for “what do I do with it” when creating kits. I originally thought of these as pins, but not everyone likes big pins on their jacket like I do, so I also show how to finish these with a keyring or to put a hanger on them and use them like an ornament (not pictured). I’ve seen people talk themselves out of making things that they really love because they “don’t know what to do with it” so I think the more ideas I can give, the better! (A class member also suggested making magnets, which I think is an awesome idea.)

I decided it would be fun to teach this one as a class before I launched it as a kit. So a week or so ago, I did a Zoom class and a group of us made these cats together. It was so much fun! When I was sending things out to the members of the class, we chatted about their cats, and I realized that being able to personalize your cat was really important, so I decided that every kit should have a little extra felt so you could make your felt cat look like *your* cat if you wanted to by adding extra stripes or patches. We also played around with a couple of different ways of adding whiskers.

When I got done with virtual class, I went back through my kit instructions really carefully and thought about all of the things we talked about in class and made sure I included those little details in the step-by-steps. I thought it was all done and ready to launch so I set up to take photos for the Etsy listing so I could post it later in the week.

It wasn’t until I was putting together a kit for a different class that I started thinking about these cats again and realized they weren’t quite finished. I attended a webinar by Spoonflower and Lilla Rogers this morning and we had a conversation about “pretty”. She talked a lot about that subjective “pretty” factor that makes designs really appealing and how that’s something she looks for. That’s exactly what these cats were missing: that little bit of something that took them from just a cute cat to “I have to make that”. So I went back to the drawing board.

When I was a kid, our cat Bob was an indoor/outdoor adventurer and he was a little too good at catching birds. So my mom got him a collar and put jingle bells on it so he couldn’t be quite as stealthy. So I grabbed some scraps of felt and made a collar with a jingle bell for my felt cats. Bingo! I LOVE these now. Whether it’s the nostalgia of thinking about my own favorite cat or the extra little detail that makes these a little more whimsical, I think the bell is exactly what they needed.

So you guessed it! More samples! I stitched three more samples, re-wrote a section of the instructions, and took a bunch more pictures and these became the finished cat designs. Yesterday I put together the first batch of kits for my Etsy shop. These kits are great for beginners and I hate how so often beginner (or kid-friendly) kits are made with low quality “cheap” materials. I love beautiful materials to work with anytime I am teaching, so these kits are made with my favorite materials: wool/rayon felt and perle cotton thread and stone and glass beads.

So now I have dogs, cats and sheep. What’s the next animal I should do in this series? I’d love to hear what you think!

9 June, 2021

Fabric Review: Spoonflower’s Minky, Celosia Velvet and Performance Velvet

2021-06-09T15:02:49-05:00Everything Else, Fabric Reviews, Sewing & Design, Spoonflower & Fabric Design|2 Comments

Spoonflower just introduced their new Performance Velvet fabric and I thought that it was a great time to do a fabric review of the Three Plush Fabrics of Spoonflower. As always with my other reviews of Spoonflower fabrics, I just want to say that these are my own opinions and experiences with these fabrics. I don’t get any kind of promotional, incentive, or other kickbacks; I just like to be able to share some in-depth info with students in my classes and all of you out there trying to get started designing your own fabrics.

Spoonflower has three great fabrics with a napped or plush finish: Minky, Celosia Velvet, and Performance Velvet. You can click through any of those links to see the detailed specs on each of those fabrics.

What they have in common.

All three of the fabrics have several things in common. All three are 100% polyester and 54″ printable width. All three have a plush or napped surface, which vary in pile length from .5mm (celosia) to 2mm (minky). All three are heavier or thicker weight fabrics compared to quilting cotton.

All of the printed designs are technically sharp, because the plush fabrics move around as you brush your hand over the surface, that can make fine details disappear and edges look softer than if you print on a smooth fabric like Sateen or Poplin.

Key Differences.

Here are some of the key differences I noticed that might help you choose which fabric is best for your project.

Fabric Base Color

Minky and Performance Velvet are bright white, where Celosia has a little more cream undertone. I don’t think it effects the print colors substantially, but you would notice if your design had a lot of white space or lighter colors in it. You can see in the photo above that the pale blue on the bottom of the design is slightly greener on the Celosia Velvet because of the warm base color underneath.

Look and Feel of the Fabrics

All three are very soft to the touch, but I think the Performance Velvet has the nicest hand feel with a very soft surface and a thick plush feeling fabric. Although Minky is very soft on the surface, it is also the thinnest of the fabrics, so it doesn’t feel as substantial. Celosia Velvet has a plush that feels slightly stiffer, more of what I think of as “upholstery velvet”.

Each fabric also has a distinct finish. Celosia Velvet has a subtle shine that is my personal favorite. I think that little bit of reflection gives it a more luxe look than the others. Performance Velvet has a matte finish. It reminds me of a vintage cotton velvet that you occasionally find in a thrift store. Minky looks “furry” to me and I think you see the nap or the fact that it’s a plush much more obviously than the others.

Drape

I think this is one of the most distinct differences between the three fabrics. In the photo above I tried to demonstrate so you can see how each fabric behaves. On the left, I pinched the fabric and picked it up, so you can see how the folds fall naturally. On the right, the fabric is laid flat, pinched and twisted.

Celosia Velvet is the stiffest, even though it’s about 2oz lighter per yard than the Performance Velvet. It has a more structural feel and no stretch. You can see it falls in very stiff folds.

Performance Velvet is the next softer drape. Although it is technically a thicker/heavier fabric, it falls in softer folds when you pick it up and it moves a little more freely.

Minky has the most drape of the three, with a more liquid sort of movement. It is only 6 oz per yard compared to Performance Velvet’s 11 oz, so even though it reads as “thick” it is really lighter weight. You can see the “furry” surface of Minky most when it is bent or rippled. Minky is also the only one of the three fabrics with a little stretch on the widthwise or cross grain.

The Back

One thing I think is always missing is a little info about what the reverse side of these fabrics look and feel like, which really is important for some projects.

Celosia Velvet is the most “upholstery” like with a plain woven back. Although Spoonflower’s site says it is a knit, it’s definitely not, as you can see the structure and it frays exactly as you’d expect a woven to do. It’s not exactly rough on the back, but it feels sturdy rather than soft.

Performance Velvet has a backing that feels and looks a lot like craft felt. It’s soft and has a slightly brushed look. The Performance Velvet is much creamier white on the back than it is on the front.

Minky has a smooth knit on the reverse.

What can you make with them?

I’ve used all three of these fabrics for different projects: Sara Coat (left), Filter Other Offset Jacket (middle), SeaSerpent Pillow (right). (you can click on any of those titles to read more and see larger photos)

Before Spoonflower had introduced either of the velvet options, I decided to try making a coat out of Minky. Because the Minky is so relatively light weight and stretchy, I actually backed all of the fabric with an inner lining of a lightweight twill before I sewed this coat so it looks much less drapey than it really is. That was a good choice for this project. It has a great texture, almost like a faux fur and the cuffs were made with velvet ribbon stitched in stripes. It was easy to sew, although I think my choice to line it also helped with that. If I were going to make a throw or a cuddly quilt, I would go for Minky with something else as a backing because it is so drapey; the others would make very stiff blankets.

The Filter Other Offset jacket is made from Celosia Velvet and I think the photo almost captures some of the sheen. Because velvet has a nap that wants to “push” the pieces out of alignment with each other as you sew, this took a lot of pinning and I really appreciated the walking foot on my sewing machine. I have also made a number of tote bags and other project bags from Celosia and everyone always comments on how nice it feels. I think Celosia makes a project look lush. I don’t think Celosia would be really great for clothing other than outerwear type uses. It really doesn’t have much drape so it’s good for structured or tailored shapes. I have also done a little upholstery with the Celosia Velvet.

The pillow was made from a sample fat quarter I ordered of the Performance Velvet. It’s a great pillow fabric! It was easier to sew than the Celosia (with much less slipping) and I really like the way it felt substantial and it went together so fast. I would really like to make a jacket from the Performance Velvet next. I think because it is a little softer/drapier than Celosia that it might make a great casual jacket or a winterweight skirt. I also think Performance Velvet would make great stuffed toys.

The fabric design featured in this post is called Wildflowers. It is made from a cut paper illustration made from handpainted paper and is available in my Spoonflower shop.

11 January, 2021

Resting the Creative Brain through Stitching

2021-02-12T18:28:39-06:00An Artist's Life, Embroidery|1 Comment

I spent August stitching. And September. And October, November and December. In fact, I still have a box of stitchery on my dining room table and I pick up something almost every night. My job as an artist means that I am making things during most of the hours of my work days. Depending on the day I am writing, or photographing, or assembling kits or making things for my Etsy shops, or making art for one of half a dozen projects. But all of those things I do during my work day are “me powered”. I am the one designing, making the creative decisions, assembling the practice pieces, doing the edits. It’s a one-woman-show here and if I’m not doing the work, then nothing gets done. Most of the time I love it and I love being busy.

But with everything going on in 2020, my creative brain was feeling just tapped out. I’m sure this sounds familiar to some of you. I managed to keep a lot of my regular juggling balls in the air, so to speak, but I just didn’t have much capacity for taking on anything new or thinking of the next new thing or the next big art project. The class proposals that I used to put together in an afternoon were taking me a week (with a lot of procrastinating). I couldn’t think of anything to write here on the blog. I didn’t want to make art because it just felt like it was simultaneously too much to take on and why-bother-because-no-ones-going-to-see-it-anyway-because-everything-is-cancelled. It was really frustrating and exhausting, so I just kept getting sucked in to doomscrolling and reading Firefly novelizations because it was just easier.

Mr Scrooge Ornament, pattern by Larissa Holland mmmcrafts.etsy.com

Let me introduce you to my friend Mr. Scrooge. He’s an ornament pattern designed by my friend Larissa Holland at mmmcrafts. (This one’s stitched by me.) He’s grouchy and “bah humbug”ish and utterly delightful. At least I think so. In August, I decided that Mr. Scrooge was the perfect metaphor-in-an-ornament-form for 2020, so I decided to make Scrooges for my sisters as a Christmas gift. He’s made from embroidered and beaded felt and entirely hand sewn, so really a perfect kitchen table kind of project while watching vintage episodes of All Creatures Great and Small.

What I realized as I started stitching was that it was exactly what my brain needed: to follow someone else’s pattern. There are lots of studies and reports about the physical act of stitching or knitting and the meditative effects it has on the brain. But what I also came to realize is that there is something really restful in following a pattern and letting someone else steer the creative ship. Although I got to do the fun part of picking out the colors, for everything else, I didn’t have to problem solve, troubleshoot, design, or choose anything. I just followed the directions. Stitch the beads to lower left coat trim, then go to step 5.

Soon, almost every night after dinner, I would turn off the news and the social media and pull out some felt to stitch. Although I don’t do embroidery or beadwork for my business (for many reasons), I love both things and my hands have years of practice. It was fun to have a reason to dive into my stash of beads and vintage sequins for the perfect shade of rosy pink or try out that Kreinik metallic thread. I made one Scrooge. And then another. I stitched my way through the rest of the autumn making Santas, Scrooges and sardines for friends and family. And even though it’s January, I started a partridge and a pear for myself this week.

I realized, as I was thinking about writing this post about my new-found daily stitch practice, that it was the practice of craft that I needed right now. I didn’t make a lot of art this past year, but instead I found myself drawn to the craft: the precise, detailed, fine craft work with my hands. That’s what made me feel grounded and my brain feel a little less overwhelmed. And it’s not just me. My mom took up cross-stitch again this year after a couple of decades. My dad made me a turned wood rolling pin for Christmas. I saw a good friend post a finished cross-stitch piece on her Facebook feed just this morning. Another friend made a delicate straw star ornament for me that I have hanging in my window and I Instagram chatted with someone else about learning to make our first hard covered books coincidentally on the same week. My friend MissChiff has assigned herself 1000 hours of painting to practice her watercolor skills.

So maybe if you’ve run out of Mandalorian episodes and you want to reduce your mindless phone surfing, try folding some origami. Or teaching yourself cross stitch. Or finger knitting. Or sketching. Or making friendship bracelets. Maybe it’s the thing your brain needs too.

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