Embroidery Library

Just a quick reminder to pick up your May Freebies at Embroidery Library. They have a lovely flower pot and for both Canadians and Americans some patriotic designs for Memorial Day. Embroidery Library's designs always sew out well and are a great place to pick up machine embroidery designs.

I'm still recovering from a left knee revision that I had on the 18th and am still limited in both my computer usage and sewing machine time. However, knowing how soon a wedding will be coming up, I have been working little by little on quilt blocks for the wedding quilt. I just hope I can get it done on time. I don't know where the time goes. At least after next Thursday I won't be spending 4-6 hours on a CPM machine daily which is a huge time hog, but my knee is doing great so I'm not going to complain!

Another Little Dress

I was very happy to be able to finish another Little Dress for Africa yesterday. Not only have I been enjoying making them and thinking of how happy some little girl will be to get her new dress, I have also been working hard in improving my sewing techniques. This 'Fish dress' features a hem band in contrasting fabric with decorative stitching on it to resemble water movement. I also made a band that I attached as a ruffle at the top front of the dress. This fish material is bright and perky and leftover from making my son Ron a quilt back over 20 years ago. I'm so glad to have projects that could use up these stray pieces.

While making this dress, I referred to The Dressmaker's Handbook of Couture Sewing Techniques by Lynda Maynard for making the French seam in the back of the dress and for making and attaching the hem band. I did learn that the band needed to be put on first before the French seam is made, otherwise the seam shows on the outside of the garment. I had some unsewing to do with this dress. I also realized after the fact that I had forgotten to use the border presser foot that came with my Janome Horizon which would have helped the stitches stay even.

I will probably be doing only some hand sewing if that for the next couple of weeks as I am going into the hospital for a knee revision on the 18th. I don't want to start any new projects until I'm recuperated. I have been working when I have a few minutes on Ron and Savannah's wedding quilt. Hard to believe the big day is barely four months away! I'd better hustle.

New Freebie at Oma's Place

Visit Oma's Place to see their new freebie alpha bet and to see the other machine embroidery designs that they have.

Check out our Machine Embroidery page here on our blog for lots more machine embroidery design companies.

Secrets of Embroidery Machine Embroidery Site

The Secrets of Embroidery website has some great new April specials including Easter designs. They also have some lovely new freebies. Make sure you drop in to take advantage of them.

For more machine embroidery websites, visit out Machine Embroidery page.

Hyperquilting Patsy Thompson Design

Thanks to my Janome 7700 digest friends, I just found a great quilting site called Patsy Thompson Designs. She has a great technique called hyperquilting that is gorgeous. I still haven't mastered regualr Free Motion Quilting yet, but this technique is certainly something to strive for. When you have a minute go take a look at her site.

Japan Earthquake Relief

Due to the devastation in Japan, we wanted to let you know that now, March 14^th through March 31, 2011, 10% of the sales at our store, Moonwishes Sewing and Crafts will be donated to Japan Earthquake Relief by way of CAMA Disaster Relief Fund the relief branch of the Christian and Missionary Alliance. With so many lives lost and property washed away, we wanted to be able to reach out a helping hand as best as we can. Thank you for your purchases or direct donation to the CAMA Diasaster Relief Fund.

Made another dress

Last night instead of making my brain go to mush watching TV, I whipped up another Little Dress for Africa . These dresses are so much fun to make and also make good use of remnants and yard/thrift store finds of trims, lace, bias binding, etc. When I see that stuff for sale at yard and thrift stores, I can't resist it when the price is so cheap, especially knowing how much it will be to buy at the fabric store. Anyhow, I'm having fun making these dresses and have a lot more planned. It is a nice break fromr the quilting I've been doing since I'm actually in the cutting out stage which is quite boring after awhile. The quilt I'm making requires something in the neighborhood of 3000 2 1/2" squares. So I've been cutting enough squares out for four blocks, make them and then cutting enough for four more blocks, etc. But I'm making what my DIL-to-be has asked for and she is so special, it is a joy to make something for her.

Quilting

If you love quilts and quilting, you will want to see this fantastic video that is both inspiring and shows the many different ways we can arrange quilt blocks. The video takes less than 7 minutes to watch so is just a nice break in your day. Called Quilt by Gayle Thomas.

Little Dresses for Africa

Wanted to show you my first Little Dresses for Africa dress. This was so much fun and easy. I'm looking forward to making many more and trying out different sewing techniques at the same time. Just making this dress, made me realize I don't have a really good grasp of attaching lace. I'm hoping to be able to be working on my next dress later this evening.

Little Dresses Project

I feel so blessed to have such an abundance of sewing goods, both machines, notions and fabric that I try to give back as much as possible. One of those ways has been turning out a Project Linus quilt each year. I have had it in my heart for months now though, that I would like to make dresses for little girls that really need them. Today on Facebook I found a project that touched me called Little Dresses for Africa. Simple dresses are made for girls out of new or gently used pillowcases, or using a simple pattern that can be found here compliments of  Nancy's Notions. They also collect shorts for boys if that is where your heart lays. I love finding different sewing projects to present here to readers as you never know which project might be the one that God lays on your heart to help with.

We live in a very large world but we are all connected together. By sharing our goods and talents with others, we make our world a better place for all and have the satisfaction of helping others in ways we never thought possible.

The Secrets of Embroidery

The Secrets of Embroidery is having a sale this March with over 500 design sets for machine embroidery reduced in price. This would be a great time to visit them. They also are featuring some great Freebies right now too.

The Dressmaker of Khair Khana by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

This is a book review that I read and reviewed in my reading blog, Moonwishes Reads about a book that I thought other sewers might appreciate if only to appreciate what many of us have in our sewing rooms.

As a seamstress and a reader, I was impressed by this book. Even though there might have been technical flaws with the timeline of the book, the story itself was astonishing. In our world today, most of us who sew have sewing machines, if not more than one. We also may have embroidery machines, all sorts of notions and gadgets, access to all sorts of fabric and the freedom to use them any way we like. Here is a story of women risking their lives to sew to provide needed financial help to their family. This book will make you appreciate your freedom to sew. This review is from my Amazon Vine book review.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Dressmaker of Khair Khana: Five Sisters, One Remarkable Family, and the Woman Who Risked Everything to Keep Them Safe
by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

As a seamstress I was fascinated by this book. When their world has gone mad and life as they know it had changed, the women of Afghanistan found themselves in a peculiar situation. They could not leave their homes without a male escort, they could not work out, they had a new dress code that was so old fashioned many of the women had to borrow clothes to leave their home as they didn’t have the proper dress to satisfy the Taliban. As many of them found that they were widows with children to support they were left in a quandary. How do they support their families, feed their children and keep a roof over their heads and still follow the rules? If they didn’t follow the rules they could be beaten, tortured and killed. For women who were used to going to school (now no longer allowed), holding down jobs, and being able to shop and visit at will, not only were they in financial straights but bored beyond belief. They were essentially under house arrest.

For one family of many daughters, Kamela Sediqi found a way to be productive, earn an income and involve not only her many sisters but other women and girls from her area. She became a seamstress. With one sewing lessons from her married sister that was a tailor, she set up shop and made her first garment. Escorted by her younger brother, she went to the market, avoiding the Taliban soldiers, and took orders for the dresses she and her sisters would make. As someone who has sewed for 40+ years, she did something I would never even think of attempting. But she got orders and took them home and carefully she and her sisters cut the cloth and hand sewed and embroidered the garments. Her business grew, all being secretly done in her home, to the point she was able to hire other women and girls to help her and thus also help with their financial difficulties.

Sewing by lamplight and eventually with sewing machines during the times of infrequent electric power, Kamela and sisters and friends, beat their boredom, supported their families and showed that even when the chips were down, they could succeed against all odds,

I very much enjoyed this book although there were some areas that were confusing, especially the timeline. I was reading the advanced reading copy so I hope someone caught the discrepancies before actual publication. Other than that, it was a very inspirational true story that I enjoyed very much.

Check out this book now:

Project Linus Quilt 2011

This year I made my Project Linus quilt using my 2" x 4" bits and pieces of bright primary color print scraps. I think any small child should be happy with all the bright colors and things to look at. It is backed with a yard sale find of what looks like bright jelly beans on a black background. I got about 4 yards of this fabric for I think it was $2 last summer and knew it would be great for backing Project Linus quilts. I try to make a quilt each year to donate. I have been so richly blessed with sewing supplies that I want to pass the blessings on and to who better but a child going through a serious illness or trauma. I trust the parents of the child will also be blessed that someone cared for their child and prepared a quilt for them long before the need arose.

This quilt was pieced on a Janome Memory Craft 9000 and was quilted with decorative stitches on the seam lines with a Janome Horizon 7700.


It is amazing how cheaply you can make a nice quilt for a project like this, just using scraps that you color coordinate. Scrap quilts, if you are careful, can look as well planned as a quilt that you have bought fabrics for. For 2012 I'm hoping to use some of my pastel scraps to make a more 'girly' quilt. With my son's wedding quilt I'll be using mostly primary colors and know I will need a rest from them when that quilt is finished.

Spray Basting a Quilt

I finished my Project Linus quilt two days ago. I don't have the photo downloaded yet, but one of the echniques I used was spray basting it and it turned out great. Here is a terrific video on both spray basting

and using your wall to spray baste on! I can hardly wait to show hubby this technique! In the meantime, I'm sharing it with you.

Terrific Quilting Sites

A question was asked on our Janome Horizon 7700 sewing digest as to who inspired us. The group came up with a lot of names of websites. I've listed them on my sewing and quilting page for every one's convenience including my own. If I find a neat site on the big desktop computer and save it to favorite places, then when I'm relaxing and want to find those great sites, I'm usually using the laptop that of course never got those favorites marked. Now all I have to do is go to my blog and click on interesting links and so can you. One of the things I try for with this blog is to be a resource for others so that they can enjoy their quilting and sewing hobbies.

I also got some great magazines in the mail the other day and just loved reading through the old copies of Dressmaking With Stitches which used to be called Australian Stitches It encourages me because of the great way they explain sewing techniques and the clothes they make are normal people clothes. You know, the kind of thing that you wear to the grocery store, a parent teacher conference, the library, living life. I only wish it was cheaper for a subscription!

Nicole's Designs

We have added another embroidery designer to our embroidery designer page. It is Nicole's Designs, which specialize in modular designs. They are perfect for decorating children's items. usually each design set has a freebie that goes along with it.

Wedding Quilt Part 1

When my son Ron proposed to Savannah we were all very happy and I started thinking wedding quilt. I started asking what type of quilt they might like and colors, etc. One day Savannah sent me a schematic of what she thought they would like.

I was very happy to have a goal of some type in mind since a queen size quilt is a large undertaking and I wanted them to like it. I got my crayons out and David made me some graph paper and I got to work converting her ideas into something that could be sewn and without too many odd angles to sew. It took several attempts but at last I had a reasonable rendition of what she had drawn, expanded into a queen size quilt. When she was her at Christmas she gave her stamp of approval to the final design.

The above picture represents only one half of the quilt. It will be made with 2 1/2" squares for the most part. It is to be a scrap quilt using a huge variety of fabrics. This of course, meant I got to go through all my stash pulling out the different fabrics that I thought might go. I also pulled pre-cut 2 1/2" strips and squares. I did have to buy some more yellow fabrics as I didn't feel I had a good enough selection of them and I didn't wanted to have too many repeats of the same fabrics.

My calculations tell me I will need to cut over 1700 2 1/2" squares for this quilt. Since that seems like a mammoth job, I stuck all the colors except for the red and purple fabrics in a box until I get the red and purple cut up. Then they can go downstairs to sew during my breaks from doing dishes, etc. and I can pull out the next colors to work on. I look forward to making this quilt and sharing it with you. Hopefully it will be done by the August 2011 wedding.

Sherlock Holmes Wallhanging

When Embroidery Library came out with some great reading related designs, I just knew I had to make something with the Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Design for my husband. David is a huge Sherlock Holmes fan and has helped suck me into being a fan also! I had thought originally to embroider out the design and then frame it in a conventional frame, purchased at the thrift store and spruced up by me. Well when the first sew out was in process, something got caught behind the machine and messed things up so I had to start over. Then I ran out of thread, but thankfully was able to substitute another color and it doesn't show too much! But when it was finished, I really liked it until I tried to frame it. It was just a tad too big which meant I had to think through what to do with it. First I quilted it and then tried some techniques that were new to me. I mitered the corners and used a facing to the front instead of binding it and did a raw edge applique for the frame shape. I had a great time trying out some of the decorative stitches on my Janome Horizon 7700; a very fun machine to work with! David was very pleased with his gift and now all we have to do is decide where to hang it.

Oma's Place Embroidery Designs with a Message

Oma's Place has an assortment of different designs, including those for parents with special needs children, Christian home designs and other. Many of her free designs have the .pes extension so be sure you can reformat the design before downloading or buying a design.

4-Hobby Machine Embroidery

Happy New Year to all! May this be a great year with lots of wonderful sewing projects completed. I had posted about this site before, but in case you hadn't seen it yet, I did want to remind you that 4-Hobby Machine Embroidery carries a selection of Judaica symbols in machine embroidery and several Hebrew alpha bets. I know these types of designs are fairly hard to find so for those who are looking, please check this site. They also have several other types of ethnic designs including Hamsa.