Amethyst's Shiny Pebbles

So, I was putting together the bird bag earlier today.  I use a light cotton duck for the body and a (undoubtedly unnecessarily heavy) nylon thread for sewing, with an (also undoubtedly unnecessarily heavy) 110/18 jeans needle.  I start with a very long piece of fabric, fold it in half (with the fold being the bottom), sew up the edges with a triple seam stitch, finish the seams with an overlocking stitch, and then use standard straight stitching for the top and attaching the handles.  The stitch length is generally 3-3.5 mm to account somewhat for the heaviness of the fabric; I may be Doing It Wrong and having the stitches be kind of too big, but the standard 2.5 mm made things behave badly.

( Sewing problems with photos )

Here's some of the stuff I've embroidered recently.

( Picspam! )
I haven't been as happy with the patterns that came with the machine as I have with the patterns I've bought off the web.  Part of the problem is likely that the booklet that came with the machine only has REALLY TINY pictures of the big patterns, so it's really hard to see what they look like in any detail.  Also, this particular set of patterns got printed out a shade or three too dark. Further, there's just color swatches next to each picture, without a written description of what each color is _for_.

What I would love, is to have embroidery software that can (1) read the .pcf files that are on the machine (and which are made whenever I put a combination of stuff together, like the Cthulhu text) and (2) has thread color choices that at least are pretty close to the colorset I've got.  I've now had two patterns (the ducks and the palm tree thing) where I've been distinctly disappointed by the thread colors I've used, and I'd really like to have a way to simulate results without having to spending an hour or so using materials to stitch out a pattern.

So I have a piece of canvas which is now thoroughly decorated and is ready to turn into a bag.  I spent last night with some super-strong nylon thread, a couple of different kinds of 90/14 needles, and some canvas scraps to see what was going to work with regards to construction.  What I learned:

- I always like to at least give universal ballpoints a try.  Yup, even on wovens.  I know I'm prone enough to errors that I don't want to break any more cloth fibers than I have to.  However, the denim needle gave much better results: no puckering, didn't have to mess with the stitch length or anything to keep it happy.

- I have a couple of options for construction.  These bags are meant to be used, darnit, but I don't know how much I need to over-engineer them, esp. given that I'm using something pretty close to upholstery thread for them.  I could:

  - do a regular straight stitch for the seam,and then
      - do a serge-type overlock, which will work as reinforcement as much as it works as a seam finish
      - do a fake French seam: fold both edges of the seam inward, then sew along the outside, catching all 4 layers.  Disadvantage of this finish: not specificially a reinforced stitch.


 - do a reinforcing triple stitch for the seam, and then
     - either do a simple zigzag to overlock, which is not super-reinforcing
     - do the fake French seam as above.

I can't really do the fake French seam on both the top and the side without leaving a bit of edge that's going to be susceptible to fraying.  So probably I'm going to go with the simple single seam and do the serge-like overlock, even though that will use a lot of thread.

Note to self: The nylon thread, if left idle in the top of the machine, likes to kind of stick at first and can be a little hard to pull through.  As far as the stitches themselves go, the tension looks fine though.

Another note:  Knots: As I'd noticed in the embroidery session last weekend after the serious thread clog, there's something up with the knotting process.  It kind of feels like the bobbin end isn't long enough to get caught up properly for the knot making (though that may be due more to the stiffness of the nylon thread than anything else).  If I want a knot with this thread, I need to pull the bobbin thread up out of the hole first and hold some of the top thread.  This will be important for serging, which only has the knot option.  Regular seams can just use backstitching, which seems to lock the threads fine.  It will be interesting to try knots with just regular weight cotton and see what happens.  I'll be down in Sunnyvale sometime next week and had been planning to stop by Eddies to pick up some stuff anyway; I will ask about it then and perhaps schedule a service while I'm away on vacation in November.

I'm probably being too ambitious, as usual.

It turns out my real first embroidery project is going to be a bunch of tote bags, some of which are going to turn into hostess presents for folks we're staying with in November.  Hence, so as not to spoil the surprise for Some People, I'm going be rather vague about what I'm actually doing.

I found a design online that I really like.  Thing is, it's big and it's solid; it's something like 48,000 stitches, and close to 6"x7".  Which is fantastic for the front of a tote bag.  But it's also about a zillion times bigger than anything else I've embroidered thus far.  It's a simple design: 6 colors, with switchings back and forth for a total of 9 spools used, with huge swaths of one color or another.  It looks rather like a large patch in terms of its makeup, actually.

I've got the fabric for My Very First Bag (tm) cut out, and done the various measurements to get the design centered.  (Much more work than I expected, but I took notes so that hopefully it'll go faster next time!)  I've got some medium-weight cutaway stabilizer for it, which is what the design company recommends, and which they say is excellent for the light canvas/duck that I'm putting it on.  I'm not actually trying to stitch the design today/tonight, because I need to pack for our trip tomorrow, and because the machine says it'll take 77 minutes (!) to do.  If that's just stitch time, it'll probably be more like 1.5-1.75 hours, and I want to have plenty of time when I do it.

Anyway.  Exciting!

Dear embroidery-knowledgeable folks,

I think my first embroidery project is going to be a set of nameplates (with designs) for the outsides of our brand-new cubicles.  (This is not an insane project; I have two workmates, myself, and my supervisor, for whom I'm still trying to figure out what to do.)

I think just a white background for them will be best.  I'm getting a smallish (I think it's 2"x4") cat design that came in the machine, one person is getting some flowers (haven't decided on exactly what), and the other person is getting a 4"x4" quite solid, patch-like design.  Plus names, of course.

My question: what sort of fabric should I use?  Can I just use a good muslin, or should I get something more satin/silk-like?

I get to play with my machine this weekend... :)  :)   :)

I got it.  :)  I think either the market price for the Esante went up recently, or Eddie's gave it a temporary markup, because the sale price was definitely not 25% lower than the price I was quoted a month or so ago.  However, it was still a decent chunk below that quoted price (quote: $2850; I paid $2499), and given that I was willing to pay the previously-quoted price, I was happy to take the sale.

I haven't done much with it yet. I've unpacked it from its box, and plugged it in and messed a little with the menus to make sure it worked that far, but I knew yesterday that I'd want to spend some real time with it when I first started actually messing around with it, and I didn't really have that kind of time yesterday.  I should later today, however!

One thing I noticed: it's HEAVY compared with the Featherweight. (I think it's in the vicinity of 30 lbs.)  I know Eddie's sells wheeled bags for sewing machines, and I'll see what their prices are compared with Amazon's.  I'm going to be hauling the machine around some: it's already lined up for 2 trips back to Eddie's for the sewing function intro classes, then there'll be a third for the embroidery function intro class, and then depending on how often I end up going to the embroidery club (meets once a month to do a project) I may end up hauling it around a *lot*.  Given how heavy it is, and given that I can't just leave it set up and out 100% of the time (worried about cat-induced damage) if the wheeled bag is a convenient way to store it, I may use the bag to get it from the bedroom to the dining room and back!

Pictures with me and my new girl later.  :)

I've spent the last couple of weeks perusing websites of the various sewing/embroidery machine makers, and I got to visit a Babylock store earlier this week.  I found out some things, and came to a few conclusions.

( In which there is nattering. )