Fall classes at Accent Sewing

I am so exited again to be able to teach several classes at Accent Sewing this fall!!

We will do a few serger projects, like the reversible apron on the left.

Another serger project is a plastic bag keeper on the right.

I just love to play with sergers! And this project (picture below) definitely qualifies as a 'play' - this baby bonnet has serger lace in the brim and serger smocking on the bonnet for gathers. The bonnet is done almost entirely with a serger, only the ribbons were attached by sewing machine.

I will also teach heirloom sewing projects, as the sampler quilt and celtic table runner.

Texture Magic Purse

Texture Magic by Superior Threads is sooo cool material! I played a bit with this shrinking fabric and used a pattern for 'Textured Tote' to create this purse. I experimented with different stitches, some freemotion and some straight lines, and decided a cross-hatched wavy stitch on this tote. I also taught a class on this at Accent Sewing during last spring.

One of my favorite experiment was done on off-white silk, with shiny Designer 6 -thread in bobbin and using a cross-hatched feather stitch. I think I will use that on some clothing later...

Silly Yo-yos

Some times one must do silly things... and this is an example of just that. I had purchased several of the yo-yo makers and got hooked into making a whole lot of them while watching tv. Then I saw this design in a book to decorate a sweatshirt. Of course, being me, I just could not follow the instructions, but had to make some modifications again: instead of machine applique and hand embroidery, I scanned the design into my embroidery software and digitized it, and withe couple quick hoopings the base of the design was done. Then I just added the yo-yo's for the hair. I also taught a class on this sweatshirt at Accent Sewing last spring.

Finnish Quilt Show

I noticed in early May that there was a quilt show in Mikkeli, Finland during the summer, so I gathered some fabrics, books and magazines for inspiration, and here is the result: it is an adaptation of Lizzy Allen's Black & White Dreams -quilt. I digitized the applique heart in embroidery software and used my 6-needle BabyLock BPM6 embroidery machine to create the center block. The 3-D flowers and the black quilting are also done with the embroidery machine. The rest of the quilting is done as free-motion quilting using my Bernina artista 730E (with BSR, of course). The quilt was on display at the quilt show and it even received few votes from the audience! A picture of this quilt was also included in the September issue of finnish Tilkkulehti.

Another applique project

This is an older project which I did about 3 years ago. It hangs in the hallway of our Finnish house during the summer time. It uses various applique techniques and surprice: is not totally black & white.

Summer classes

I spent the summer in Finland and enjoyed the lovely, warm weather we had. Of course, the most enjoyable part of the visit was to see my family and spend lovely time with them!

But I was also lucky enough to get an opportunity to teach sewing classes, too!

In early July we travelled to Vaasa where I taught a 2-day machine embroidery class to a lovely group of 8 very talented ladies.

Then late July we travelled to Oulu for a 3-day class with another very talented and lovely group of 12 ladies. In Oulu I taught one day about silk ribbon embroidery with a sewing machine, one day various machine applique techniques (the picture of our project is on left), and on the 3rd day we were sewing a party dress for a doll (pictures of the dress and silk ribbon embroidery are posted in my earlier posts under Martha Pullen projects).

And last but least, the quilt guild from Imatra came to our house in early August for an afternoon with serger techniques.