I finished the easter t-shirts.

Both designs are from here. Miss P’s is crooked, but there was no way I was unpicking it and trying again!

This egg turned out to be very squat.

I’ve gone back to basics: drawn my design on a piece of graph paper (the right size) and then digitised it.

This new design is slightly too big for one hooping –  hopefully this will mean the pieces won’t be so fiddly.

Both girls have decided they don’t want my egg design for their easter t-shirts, so I’ve let them look through my design collection.

Miss P picked this one …

And Miss A this one …

I’ve interrupted work on the baby quilt to make the Easter T-Shirts this year we are going to have a crazy patchwork egg. I am going to foundation piece it using my embroidery machine. Above is the design I made using Embird Studio – this is the third version and I suspect their might be more.

Here it is stitched out …

The corners don’t meet properly and the top is a bit pointy – onto version 4.

]]> http://sewwitty.com/2012/03/12/foundation-piecing-using-embroidery-machine/feed/ 0 http://sewwitty.com/2011/12/15/pinwheel-block-machine-embroidery/ http://sewwitty.com/2011/12/15/pinwheel-block-machine-embroidery/#comments Thu, 15 Dec 2011 05:48:49 +0000 SewWitty http://sewwitty.com/?p=1384

A pinwheel block – foundation pieced using an embroidery machine. This one is done in four pieces and then joined together.

I finished testing my flying geese block – it took three attempts.

I made this block using foundation (or paper) piecing on my embroidery machine. I digitised the design using Embird Studio.

The final design size is 138.4 mm by 139.6 mm.

Read this if you’re interested in using your embroidery machine to foundation piece – it does make for very accurate piecing, but your limited by the size of the embroidery hoop.

I made these blocks into a cushion cover. I just added borders until it was big enough -the back has an envelope closure (no zip!)

Next time I must remember to finish the edges of the construction seams – it’s not something you do when quilting (because the raw edges will be inside the quilt sandwich) – and it didn’t occur to me until it was too late to finish some of the border seams.

We made the teachers felt Christmas tree ornaments. This is one of the designs I used for my Advent Calendar – the back has the girls’ names and the year.

This is my final card. The design is from here.

Just adding the design rather than trying to cover the front with fabric seemed to work better – not as crinkly.

I’ve been using my embroidery machine to make foundation pieced quilt blocks. This makes for greater accuracy. I wrote a tutorial about it a few years ago – you can find it here. There are also a few free designs available for download (hour glass, snail trail, water lily and picture frame).

I digitised the log cabin myself. In the past I have used Thred as my digitising software – it’s free and they’re heaps of tutorials on how to use it. However, the limited number of colour changes meant that I had outgrown it. So I purchased Embird Studio, which is the digitising plug-in for the Embird package. I’ve been using Embird for years to convert, rezize, merge, etc designs, so I feel confident that Studio will meet my needs.

I’m finding it increasingly difficult to find designs that I like – most are frumpy, over-filled, too sentimental and just boring, so I mean to design my own.

More felt hair clips.

I sewed my finger (with my sewing machine) while making these – the needle went completely through the edge of my finger. Fortunately the needle didn’t break and the machine stopped stitching – still there was blood.

These are quite fiddly to make and I am still not sure that I attached the owl to the base very well – I hand stitched them on, but maybe glue would work better.

The design is from here, but I am currently working on some designs of my own.