Printing on Ribbon




Printing on Ribbon

   I am still waiting for the book Fabric Embellishing the basics and beyond  I ordered a couple of weeks ago to arrive.  Hopefully, it will be in my mailbox this week.  One of the projects I remembered from looking at Connie's book was printing on ribbon.  I decided to try it this weekend and I am pleased with my first results.   The book recommended to make your design layout, then save and print your design.  This helps for your alignment.  Next, you center and  place your double-stick tape over your printed words or design and then lay your ribbon on top of the tape making sure no tape is exposed. Then I think it said to put a piece of tape over the ends of the ribbon so the edges did not catch in the printer roller.  Next,  you place your ribbon paper back into the printer and print your file again. With a little luck your words or design will be centered on your ribbon.  Some of mine printed a little off center but for a first effort I am thrilled.



Printing on Ribbon Detail

 Along the way I learned that I do not need to anchor all the edges of the ribbon down with tape. Just taping the ends down that feed through the printer works great.  I think when I removed the extra tape from the edges it caused my ribbon edges to be extra wavy. Also, I do not need to bold the font as the bolding causes the ink to bleed more (this could also be due to my particular printer ink or the type of ribbon I was using). The last ribbon on the bottom is the one I used the bold font on and you can see how much darker it is.

Printing on Ribbon Close Up

What worked really well was expanding the font spacing. This kept the letters from blurring into one another.  For this project I used the 1/2 " double-stick tape but yesterday while I was out I picked up some 3/4" double-stick tape and plan on experimenting with wider ribbon and using some of the wing dings or graphics.

A Day-Cation

Cherry Blossom Trees, Washington, D.C.

My husband and I took this last Friday off to have a one day vacation.  We decided to take the train up to DC to have lunch and visit one of the Smithsonian museums. Without actually planning it we were there when the Cherry Blossom trees are closest to their peak. Our timing could not have been more perfect as today we are experiencing a little bit of snow.



Union Station

Once we arrived at Union Station we decided to walk down and over to the Air and Space Museum.  Our walk took us past the Capitol building and the Botanic Gardens.  From the Capitol building we could see the Washington Monument which is always just an awesome sight. Inside the Air and Space Museum we were amazed and awed that some of these planes, especially the bi-planes, were so delicate looking but had managed to make some extraordinary trips around the world without all the navigation equipment we have available to us today.  In the space exploration area we shook our heads at how vulnerable the first astronauts were in their spacesuits, everything looked too flimsy to withstand outer space. Then there was the display of the American flag on the moon (it is such a classic).




Washington Monument



Spirit of St. Louis

As I looked at the photos this morning, I noticed a lot of neat design elements from the cherry blossom trees, to the writing on the Spirit of St. Louis. There was the engraving on the wall of the Air and Space Museum and of course the shadow photo I took of us and then the unique architecture of Union Station.  Our day wasn't without its unexpected moments like how cold the wind was or the 2-hour delay in our homeward bound train but all-in-all it was a perfect day.

Self-Portrait Shadow Play



Space Exploration Display

 

Air and Space Museum Wall



YoYo Hearts of Clover



YoYo Hearts of Clover Mom's March Card

It was the "luck of the Irish" I finished this card in March.  It still needs to be mailed but it's finished. I'm not at all sure about the difference between a 3-leaf and a 4-leaf clover (I'm sure I could look it up) but for the sake of this design I liked the 3-leaf clover made of yo-yo hearts the best.  The yo-yo clovers are made with both the large and small heart yo-yo makers.  For the centers I knotted some gold braid, it is the same braid that forms the stem.  The finished card is not exactly as I visualized it when the idea first hit me but the best part is next year I will get to try again as I absolutely love coming up with new ways to use the different yo-yo shapes in my cards.

Apple Salad

Apple Salad Hot Pad

Saturday my friend Connie and I got together for a play date.  Our project was weaving fabric.  This technique is one Connie had done before for a class and is in the book Fabric Embellishing the basics and beyond by Ruth Chandler, Liz Kettle, Heahter Thomas and Lauren Vlcek.  I had so much fun with the fabric weaving technique and the book was full of other terrific techniques that this morning I went online and ordered it.  The hard part will be waiting for it to arrive!

Apple print fabric

We started out with our two pieces of fabric.  I chose this apple print I had and then a cream colored fabric.  These were backed with a double-sided fusible.  Next we cut wavy strips on one fabric going horizontal and on the other piece we cut our wavy stips going vertical.





Weaved fabric

 Carefully, we kept our pieces in order and started the strip weaving technique. When we had finished with the weaving we ironed (fused) the pieces together.  When my piece was finished we thought it looked a lot like an apple salad.  This morning I finished sewing a zigzag (mostly satin) stitch down each wavy strip first horizontally and then vertically and then trimmed my piece and finished the outside edges with the satin stitch.  I also had weaved a smaller piece (left side of photo) of this same fabric and I'm thinking of using it on one of my cards.  You'll have to come back at a later date to see the results of the apple salad card.

Back side of Apple Salad hot pad

Here is the back side of the hot pad.  My husband is thrilled that he now has a large enough hot pad to place under his french toast baking dish. Usually we need to place two pads under the dish.

Latest Binder Cover



Inspired by Old Sewing Notions

Each day I come into my craft room and try to create I look around, shake my head and tell myself there is just way too much stuff in the room.  While trying to thin out and pare down the amount of yarn, paints, beads, saved articles and you name it I ran across some old sewing supplies, I may have mentioned this in an earlier blog.  I saved the best of those old sewing notions but I didn't have the heart to throw out the ones that were "not so perfect" so my solution was to cover another binder using these items. Somehow I convinced myself that this project was helping to clean out my room - it's a weird justification but it allowed me to be creative while quieting the nagging little voice that was telling me I should be reorganizing and cleaning. Looking at this binder cover and my first binder cover I feel as if I have kind of got the knaack of it.

Annual Challenge Update

Tree Challenge 2011

Our Tree Challenge was a success!  We both (mostly) finished our project, although in all honesty we had more than enough time to complete it and then some - you know how it is - knowing you have plenty of time to work on it you do something else first until it is down to crunch time. The main thing though is that we are both happy with our results.  As soon as I finish thread painting a few more areas on my tree it will be finished.  I've decided to frame and hang it in my sewing room. Truth be told I could hang it up now and no one would know it wasn't finished except me!  Since I last wrote a  post about the tree, I embroidered a little cardinal sitting on one of the branches.  I'm not sure you will be able to see it in the photo though so in the future I will try to do better and take close-up photos of some of the details. 

The quilt show was very inspirational. I just love seeing all the different quilt types and the different techniques that are being used in the quilts. While at the show I purchased the Clover small oval yo-yo maker and the butterfly yo-yo maker. The small oval yo-yo maker so far is my favorite as I'm still trying to figure out the butterfly yo-yo maker with it's two-step process. Hopefully, soon I'll be able to show you some beautiful yo-yo butterflies.

Part of our annual trip to the quilt show is to select our next challenge. This year it was Connie's turn to choose and we will be making a bird (possibly using the Artful Bird: Feathered Friends to Make and Sew by Abigail Patner Glassenberg ) but we can use any pattern or make up our own plus we need to make a brooch to be worn at the 2012 quilt show. For the bird we can use any pattern but we must personalize it somehow - for me that may be figuring out how to embellish it with some yo-yos and for Connie she might create and use some of her fantasy fabric.  For now - anything and everything is possible!

"Romancing Spring" Butterfly Yo-Yo Card

With February being such a short month I knew I could not get a Valentine's Day Card made in time to send to my mom but I wanted to use my heart yo-yos. About the time I was working on the card we were having some very pretty "spring-like" days and I looked at my design and it looked like the butterfly was romancing spring and that is how the card got it's name. The butterfly was made using Clover's Large Heart Yo-Yo Maker for the wings and for the body I used Clover's Extra Small and Small Yo-Yo Makers. Did I mention I love my Cricut Expression machine? It is the best for cutting out letters and designs.

Romancing Spring-Mom's February Card

Of course I have never been good working at just one thing at a time so while working on my mom's February card I have also been paring down and weeding out some of the craft supplies I no longer use or use very seldom as I want to make room for a new table I purchased which has been riding around in my car, still in its box, for the last several weeks.  The other project (besides the Tree Challenge piece) I started was a collage binder. While going through my many boxes I came across some old seam binding packets produced by Penneys with the prices on the top.  One packet of 1/2" wide seam binding sold for 17 cents and another one that was extra wide sold for 27 cents. As I had several of these packets I decided I would decoupage them onto one of my empty binders and when completed it can hold some more of my magazine articles. My husband often refers to me as "Monica" for the Monica on the sitcom Friends who categoried and organized everything - as I have a strong tendency to do that too. My magazine articles are broken down by reference such as the best glues or threads to buy and project type such as home decor, clothing, or kids projects. Other items to be included in the collage are old zipper and snap packets. You may remember back in 2010 I had a play date with my friend Connie and covered a binder using a few of Julie Nutting's techniques. It was so much fun I decided to try it again.  If you haven't seen any of Julie's work I really encourage you to visit her site.

Painted Faces Binder Cover Completion

Finished Painted Faces Binder Cover

This week as I was looking around my sewing room I saw the unfinished binder cover taunting me as it sat stashed away on the shelf (my version of "out of sight - out of mind") so I grabbed the pattern directions and read through them one more time to figure out how the cover was sewn together.  Although I would have liked it to turn out a little better I am happy overall, especially since this was my first time using this pattern and my first attempt at making a binder cover. The pattern said the inside lining wouldn't show much so it didn't matter what fabric you used so I chose something I really didn't care for.  Unfortunately, when you open the binder it shows just a little more than I would like. I think having a coordinating lining fabric would have given it a better overall appearance. The other thing I didn't take into account was the back of the binder cover. The directions were for quilting an entire piece of fabric for the cover but since I was using my painted face project thinking how good it would look on the front I coordinated a plain piece of green fabric to wrap around to the back and that's the look I got - a plain back cover piece. You notice I made sure that didn't show in the photo. If I were to do this again I would definitely make sure that I had something a little more exciting for the back piece too. Guess I'll just have to make another cover!

Tree Challenge - Budding Leaves

Tree Challenge-Leaf Highlights

Yesterday I finally got brave enough, although I was still careful and did a mini trial run on a piece of scrap fabric, and added some leaf highlights to my tree.  It was exciting to watch the tree start to come to life as I sat and sewed the leaves onto the fabric. The leaf embroidery stitch setting on my sewing machine worked wonderful and I was even able to set the stitch length and width to add a little extra detail to the tree. I would have sewn more but pretty much I had shaded in all the light areas (at least for now). I looked through all my threads for some darker green thread that matched the tree but I didn't have the exact shades I was looking for so needless to say I went shopping for thread. Today I hope to add some of the darker shades of green to the tree.  So as to keep a few details a surprise from Connie I won't be posting anymore photos until after we meet and have our "show n' tell".

This photo is so small I 'm not sure you will be able to see all the  thread painting for the leaves, especially since I was just working on the lighter shades of green.

Challenge Update

Tree with dimension

It is getting closer to the deadline for our Tree Challenge. The due date is the day of the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Festival in Hampton Roads. Getting together on the day of the quilt show and having our "show in tell" during breakfast is one of the highlights.  The other is seeing all the magnificant quilts that inspire us to want to try our hand at trying to create something spectacular.  I feel good if I just manage to get the concept right and this time I feel I've learned a lot more about shading and coloring and that's got to be a good thing, right? Hopefully, you will be able to tell by the photo that the tree has been enhanced by couching perl cotton embroidery thread to the trunk of the tree and into some of it's branches. There are also little tiny french knots in the flower bed to enhance the mulched area. Next, will be to add some grass blades to the fence line and then machine stitch the tree leaves.  For the leaves I'm considering using the leaf stitch on my sewing machine.  My best bet will be to try it on a practice piece so I can get my stitch length set to scale. With just eighteen (18) more days to finish I better go and get busy.