Tag Archives: Machine Embroidery applique

Princess Quilt

7

My granddaughter, Kes, is the middle child. She talks about being a princess and playing princess all the time. So, she’s going to get a princess quilt. Every quilt has a story, and this one is no exception.

I recently bought a Twister template. When it came, I was surprised at how large it was. I decided that the pieces would be large enough for some novelty prints and proceeded to cut squares of “princess” fabric that I thought would work for this quilt. After I got it together, I really was not pleased. The colors blend together too much and to me, it just isn’t pretty to my eye. But, that was a lot of work, so I am finding a way to make it a special quilt anyway.

I decided to add “princess” machine embroidery to the quilt so Kes will find special little places throughout the quilt with castles and magic wands and unicorns and princess crowns. This quilt is to be enjoyed for the special little motifs rather than as a whole quilt.

What is really amusing to me is that as I stood in front of the design wall with Kes (4-1/2 years old), she informed me in the most matter of fact way that the little girls on one of the fabrics were fairies and not princesses. Of course, my reply was that princesses have to have good fairies to help them. I think we all need some good fairies along the way.

Corner of Quilt

Corner of Quilt

Corner of Quilt

Unicorn

IMG_3716-001

Frog Prince

I digitized this frog and used my Silhouette Cameo to cut the applique pieces. That was a lot of fun.

IMG_3720-001

Princess Crown from Applique Corner

This princess crown was done as traditional machine embroidery applique.

IMG_3719-001

Dragon from EmbLibrary

IMG_3714-001

Magic Wand

IMG_3713-001

Crown by EmbLibrary

She really is a sweet little girl, we love this picture. It’s obvious she is only going to do what she wants and not what the photographer suggests.

Kes--School Picture--Pre-K

Kes–School Picture–Pre-K

 

 

  
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Beautiful QOV Photos

I got an email from Maggie yesterday showing me the Quilt of Valor she made using the star machine embroidery Quilt as you Go. This is absolutely beautiful. The recipient of this quilt will be very honored to receive it. She also showed how she supported the weight of the quilt as she worked putting the rows together. This is truly a work of love and dedication.

QOV 008

 

QOV 016

 

Back of Quilt

Back of Quilt

Modified laundry basket for holding weight of quilt

Modified laundry basket for holding weight of quilt

 

Laundry Basket with shortened bag holding weight of quilt

Modified laundry basket holding weight of quilt

 

  
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Another Candy Hearts Quilt

I got an email a couple of weeks ago from Cherry at Cherry Blossoms Quilting Studio. She made the most adorable quilt using the Candy Hearts embroidery set. This is her adorable quilt. It’s a mini – but just think of the wonderful ways to use this –from a banner/ wall hanging to a table topper.

cherryblossomquiltingstudio

XOXO by Cherry Blossoms Quilting Studio

 

In fact, I was so inspired by this, that I took the stack of assorted hearts that I had and stitched them together. In the end I had five different toppers. Here are a couple of photos.

IMG_2882

 

IMG_2879

 

 

The one thing I realized later after looking at the photo of what Cherry has done and then at the hearts I stitched together, is that her hearts are on a much smaller background and are nestled closer together. If I were doing it again, I definitely would do it her way. 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Candy Hearts Quilting Progress

After posting yesterday, I continued to quilt some samples until I had a better idea of what I wanted to do on the candy hearts quilt. If you remember, this is how I started.

IMG_2850

 

After looking at this a bit, I decided to change the heart. After I did that, I looked at the background fill and decided that it would be better visually, if it were round. In the top part of the image below, you can see how I changed the background fill in the upper part of the block.

IMG_2857

 

This gave me a pretty good idea of where I was going, so I loaded the Candy Hearts quilt and started work on it. I finished the stitch in the ditch and the ribbon candy in the frames and have started adding the hearts in the plain blocks. The plain blocks are smaller than my sample, so will have to see what fill will work best in the wider areas.

IMG_2860 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Love is Everywhere

I have been working all week on an early Valentine present for those of you who do machine embroidery. The Queen of Hearts die AccuQuilt die #55325) has some pretty hearts on it, and I have digitized them with three different applique stitches that are designed specifically for quilting. This is one of the heart shapes used for the Have A Heart Make A Quilt campaign that I mentioned earlier this week. These stitches are light and flat and stay that way after laundering. All my quilts go in the washing machine and dryer, so my embroidery has to stand up to that too. Here are some photos of the set.

heart001 aphand 600

Closeup of Hand Applique Stitch

Closeup of Hand Applique Stitch

heart003 ffap

Closeup of free form applique stitch

Closeup of free form applique stitch

heart003 peb2 600

Closeup of filled pebble stitch

Closeup of filled pebble stitch

 

 

To get this Valentine gift, just email me before February 14 at busbyquilts
at gmail.com, put HEARTS in the subject line, and tell me the machine format you use. 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Fun Projects

Here are some fun things that others have been doing. Mary Jane used the frog applique for a onesie. I absolutely love this. Mary Jane asked, “Can’t you just hear him singing ‘Hello My Baby’?”

frog on onesie

Mary Jane’s Onesie Frog

And this is a quilt that my friend, Sherry, is working on. She made this as a Quilt As Your GO (QAYG), and I love everything about it. Can’t wait to see it finished.

Sherry's Quilt as you Go

Sherry’s Quilt as you Go

I have almost finished quilting Sherry’s Bargello (how many months has it been on my frame?? – four I think). Last night I rolled it to the last 18 inches. Normally I only quilt about 9-11 inches at a time as that is as much as my arms reach comfortably. Have been babysitting most of the week. My husband had a little complication with his appendectomy (peritoneal hematoma–i.e., internal bleeding after the surgery), so his work this week is to let his body get rid of all that extra blood that is sitting in his abdominal area. 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Stitch Detail

I promised on Monday to show you the stitch detail for the houses. Things turned a little upside down just after I posted that. My husband developed appendicitis and immediately after I posted, he told me we had to go to the doctor right away. We got back home yesterday after a successful surgery and two and a half days in the hospital. Hopefully, things will get back to whatever ‘normal’ actually is.

Now, for the stitch detail. I am always on a quest for an applique stitch that will hold a raw edge fusible applique in place securely enough to be washed over and over (functional quilts are a necessity at our house), that is complementary to the particular applique design, and that is at least a little bit unique. You will see that the blanket applique stitch here has a short leg and a long leg. The purpose was to make it look more like a hand stitched applique edge. The second stitch is meant to look like a free motion machine applique. And these stitches are much lighter than a satin stitch.

house003a_stitch detail001

I absolutely love satin stitch, but find that quilts with  a satin stitch applique will sometimes have a “waffle” edge on the applique after washing. The reason for this is the density of the stitching and the difference in density between the satin stitch, the applique and the background fabric. After washing and drying, the waffle edge is easily smoothed with a steam pressing from the back (yes, I do steam my quilts when needed), but it’s nice to have lots of other stitches in the repertoire for applique.

  
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Christmas Hubbub

It’s almost Christmas, and it seems as if I’ve almost missed it this year. What adventures we’ve had the past few weeks.

Today is our 37th wedding anniversary – what were we thinking back in 1975? My mother must have been nuts trying to have a wedding and Christmas. All I remember was trying to get through my Organic Chemistry exam. Some things were easy though – I wore my sister’s wedding dress, and we were the exact same size so no worries there. I was taller, so wore flat shoes and it worked perfectly.

Now, back to Christmas 2012—have had back to back colds and still have a hacking cough which I hope will disappear by Christmas. Between being sick, babysitting that adorable little boy, and visiting my Mom two times in a little over a week, not much has been going on in my Christmas department. As of today, there are still a few projects to get done and have not read anyone else’s blog in weeks, so am hoping to catch up on that sometime today too.

Every year I make pillow cases from novelty fabric for all the children, acquired children’s spouses, and grandchildren. The fabrics have all been pulled and are in a stack. Hopefully, tomorrow will bring pictures of some great pillowcases.

I made a wonderful Christmas bib for Mother while I was at her house. For some reason, she had some Christmas fabric just sitting out beside her sewing machine, and I couldn’t help myself. Somehow that bib got packed into my suitcase, so now it has to be mailed back to her.

There are two new grandsons who need Christmas stockings – one of them absolutely has to be made today to get in the mail or he won’t have a stocking. I really need Katrina over at Sunshower Quilts to the rescue.

I made some mug rugs yesterday with my embroidery machine and hope to be able to have files for you machine embroiderers to download. But that has to wait until after the pillowcases and stocking go in the mail. I’ll do a separate post for that–but here’s a preview–they still need some topstitching around the edges.

IMG_2443 (Custom) 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Christmas Quilt Show

This is my entry in this year’s Christmas Quilt Show. Entries are to be submitted from Nov 23 through Nov 30. This is one of my favorite blogland quilt shows. It is so fun to watch new entries being submitted every day. So, if you have made a Christmas quilt, join the fun and show it off.

My Christmas quilt was made last year and quilted in late summer. It has already been shipped to it’s new home with my sister here in NC. Last year, she was given a table runner and this quilt completes the set.

 

 

To make this quilt I used 8 inch blocks and 2 inch sashing. The embroidery blocks were made with the AccuQuilt Holiday Medley die and machine embroidery. The Irish chain blocks use a 4″ square in the middle and 2″ squares in the corners. I just went back through all my blog posts so that I could link a tutorial for this Irish chain variation and realize I haven’t done one. So, a tutorial on making these 8″ Irish chain blocks will be forthcoming very soon. 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie

 

Fall Machine Embroidery Blog Hop Winners

Drum roll . . . . And we have winners. the week was lots of fun and I learned so many things. And I want to say thank you to all of the participants and to let you know that there were winners of every day and that they have all been notified and that all but one of the prizes has been received. Here’s the lineup of winners:

Monday, Nov 5 – LeAnne

Tuesday, Nov 6 – Kathleen

Wednesday, Nov 7 – Kathy

Thursday, Nov 8 – Sue

Friday, Nov 9 – Vicki and Rita

If I don’t hear from Sue (Thursday, Nov 8) within the next week, Kelly at I Have A Notion, and I will select an alternate winner.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

 
 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed your visit. Come again soon.

Marjorie