Starshine Stitches

Madison Rose

What a wonderful kid!

Madison was just spectacular to work with.  The perfect 6X with the most willing attitude.  Here she is wearing the Madison Rose Dress.   It has a high yoke - my favorite for girls who want to look like girls.  Full twirly skirt for spinning on the lawn.  It can also be worn with a shirt as a jumper.  Remember jumpers? 

Kids clothes are just too much fun to work on.  I enjoyed it when mine were little and still don't have it out of my system. 

email me for pattern #MD-02 information cwinslo5@optonline.net

 The butterflies went to market.  The pockets missed the crates.......

Broidery purse a teacake.....or add a rosette.....

It's a back to work day for me, more about the embellishments another day.

Back to the workroom, Cheryl
 

Hydrangea Wholecloth Quilt Pattern

Truly, some fabrics are just to pretty to cut up.  Holly's Hydrangea fabric is one of them.  The clusters of blooms are wonderful.   Using the fabric as it comes off the bolt is a bit tricky.  In simple words, it has no central focal point.  The focal point needs to found and centered.  The small picture is the fabric as it comes off the bolt.  There are 3 1/2 large blooms across the width.  The quilt above centers one of the large blooms to create a pleasant grouping.  The pattern includes twin and queen quilt sizes.  Email me for pattern information and pricing (WC-01).  Wouldn't this look great in a guest room, or an entry way? 

I took the quilt to guild show and tell after market and was asked how long it took to make.  Let me answer it here, 10 hours minus the hand finishing.     Let's break that down.  About an hour was devoted to finding the "sweet spot" on the yardage.  45 minutes to cut the panel (first time to do this takes time) and the booth requirements must be met!  Borders usually take me 1/2 hour ( add 10 minutes for the stripe- gotta keep it straight).  When the tops are finished I usually assemble the binding, 20 minutes.  Marking the scallops was quick, less than 10 minutes.  The remainder of the time was quilting.   

Quilting was the bulk of time with this one.  I wanted the quilt to have a trapunto effect but didn't have the time to do the real thing.  So I layered a polyester batting on top of a cotton.  The cotton will shrink just a bit after washing and the poly will not. 

The flower blooms are "lightly" quilted and outlined.  The filler around them had to be tight, to give the blooms lift.  Holly hated my choice - oh well.  I used it for 2 reasons.  1. it's quick.  2. it's easy to get around the stems.  It's not the best choice but the market clock was ticking and it had to get finished. 

I want to go back and try an idea on the inner border........ more on that later.

The outer border was quilted to look like a large scale stripe/floral print.  Crosshatching is one of the hardest things to do on a longarm.  Picture trying to fill an "Etch-a-Sketch" screen with crosshatching.  The longarm works kind of the same way, horizontal and vertical movements that combine to make diagonals.  There are no feed dogs to guide the stitches, you must use a ruler along the hopping foot to stitch a straight line.   

I hope you enjoyed a peek at this project.

Back to the workroom, Cheryl   

Ruffler/ Pleater

A post for Sam, who has a pleater and doesn't use it.

Those who know me understand that I have a love of gadgets.  The ruffle attachment is an old friend of mine.  $1.00 at a garage sale and a few hours and I was on my way.  I had no idea what the thing did or how to use it.  The price was right- cheap entertainment.

The darn thing may look intimidating but it's not.  There are 3 things that control the finished product.  Another hint is to make the ruffle longer than needed.  The fist few inches are usually flat, just needed to feed the fabric into the machine. 

The first control is the screw.  It is on the right center of the picture.  It controls the depth of the pleat.  The deeper the screw the deeper the pleat.

The second control is the little tab and slot thingie.  It is in the right above the screw, and faces you when the pleater is on the machine.  It is numbered 1, 6, and 12.  That is the number of stitches the machine takes before it takes a pleat.  The 1 will take a pleat every stitch.  The 6 (personal favorite) takes 6 stitches and on the 6th stitch takes a pleat.  Now the 12 is rather difficult to use, no matter how much I play with it.

The third control is the stitch length on the machine.  The shorter the stitch the closer the pleat, the longer the stitch the more distance between pleats. Simple-

To use the gadget you just feed the end of the fabric between the front guides on the foot to keep the line of stitching even.  Run the fabric under the "grabber", and go.  Hold the fabric in front gently so the grabber can do it's work.   

Some combinations work better than others.  A tab setting of 1 (one pleat per stitch) works well with a shallow pleat  and a bit longer stitch length.  If you really must use the darn 12 setting, tiny stitch length combined with a deep pleat is about the only useful setting.  If anyone out there has a useful combination/application for the 12 setting I would love to hear about it!

My absolute favorite setting...... slot of 6, 2.0 to 2.5 mm stitch length, and the screw all the way in.  It makes a wonderful full ruffle.

It's Monday and the holiday is over.

Back to the workroom.........Cheryl

Sunshine Dress for toddlers

Remember when little girls looked sweet?  This latest LakeHouse collection is just perfect for little girls.   I had great fun with the fabrics for these dresses.  The combinations of cute were endless.   The Sunshine dress is easy  and fun.   One pattern piece for the yoke,  a few cuts for the skirt and ruffle and your favorite toddler is set to go.  She can even dress herself- very big stuff.   Email me directly for pattern information or orders at cwinslo5@optonline.net.

My own daughter was born in Florida, on a 105 degree day.  She was a real girly girl and loved dresses.  It was a  bit of fun to choose the fabrics together.  It lasted until second grade.   This is a picture of the first day of school.  I wish I had the time at market to actually do a quilt with appliqued paper dolls.  The collection was just the ticket for it.  Her dress is smocked with paper dolls.  It was great to have a girl to sew for.  If only I had a better camera when she was a toddler.   She had a little sundress for every day of the week. 

Back to the Workroom

Cheryl