Today, I got around to doing some weaving; however, I didn’t weave too long since I was simply not feeling the process.

I’m sure we’ve all been there right? We want to engage in a craft, but when we actually get that time, we no longer want to do that. Sometimes, I can push through that and other times (like this evening) I know I better stop since I’m not in that mindset. It was a bit disheartening, especially when you thought you were ready to roll.  Since I did want to do “something,” I pulled out that ruffled shirt that I’d been sewing and decided to add some embroidered butterflies to the side. You know, just like the machine embroidered butterflies, that I had added to the pants, but these would be done in a different color.

 

In the above picture, you see what is going on while the machine is embroidering.

 

And here’s an example of the completed project. It’s still shows the markings of my chalk pencil. As I mentioned before, it’s important that the placement of your design is accurate.

 

This shirt isn’t finished. I think I’ll add bead work to some of the butterflies and I do believe, that I’ll remove the sleeves and redo them. Before I sew them together, I might embroider some butterflies to the sleeves. I’ll see how it looks (via paper placement of the design) before I make my decision.

 

Last evening, I embroidered these pants for my daughter.

“These pants” are technically mine; however, one day they found their way into her drawer. . . Yes, my 11 year old daughter can now wear my clothes! My how they grow, right?

 

I will say, that this was a great stitch out. The above embroidered design was over 22,000 stitches. Before I could even think about stitching, I had to measure where I wanted the design placed. I then pulled out one of my rulers and started marking the fabric with my chalk pencil.

This “could” have been hooped, but it wouldn’t have been a fun time for me because of the narrow width of the pant leg. To avoid this, I pulled out my newest seam ripper and started ripping out a side seam.

The bottom stabilizer was floated on the 5×7 hoop and on the wrong side of the pant leg. Two pieces of water soluble stabilizers were placed on the top aka right side of the pant leg. I doubled up on the top, because I noticed puckering when I initially started embroidering. So, why did I experience some puckering? The pants material is made out of a very lightweight knit. Additional support was needed to protect the fabric from all the stitching. In some places, there are numerous stitches. I most likely could have avoided doubling if I had medium or definitely heavyweight water soluble stabilizer on hand. 

I did make one major mistake.

 

Can you spot what I did incorrectly? I should have swapped colors since the blue is darker than the green butterflies.

 

You know what? My daughter isn’t complaining and she received a lot of compliments about her pants today at school. I would say that these embroidered pants were a success!

She attends a private school and they normally have to wear a uniform, but since they had a walk-a-thon they were allowed to wear casual clothes.

A few days ago, I finished this bag. The only thing left to do was add some type of tie. Originally, I’d planned on purchasing ribbon and then it dawned upon me… I have yarn! I could simply crochet a string or knit and icord.

I chose this color and crocheted a cord. My daughter thought it should have been magenta or electric blue. Neither one of those colors are in my yarn stash now.

I also made this bag. My daughter loves it even more than the first and asked could she swap. Did I mention she already is using the first bag and it now has a permanent home in her bookbag.

To complete this project, I used two machines; machine embroidery and sewing machine. Additionally, I hand basted some stitches and I crocheted a cord for the first bag.