Embroidery Tools – DMC Medicis Wool

Just look at what the cat dragged in!

Seriously…I really do have a stash to show. 😉

*This is a little stray kitty that has claimed an empty basket as his own. It’s a teeny tiny basket and he barely fits in it. His ‘momma’ is one wild feral thing, but the babies are all adoptable. He’s on a card table outside in our car port.*

Hubby and I went on a little run to the local art stores. We visited a paint and graphics place, (for Oil Paint) and I of course HAD to squeeze in the Local Needle supply Shop Fiddlesticks . We are pretty loyal customers there. We’d hate to see Hawaii without a great supply store like them.

Guess what I found!

Medicis Wool

Fiddlesticks has DMC Medicis wool on clearance for 50% off! It’s 63 cents a skein! (I guess it’s been discontinued by DMC.)

So, I now have a haul of wool to work with as part of my needle thread palette. I’m so excited! I can’t wait to create some designs with them. I’ve had some for some rose buds that I’m creating, but this will open my palette to more textures. I got a few fistfuls…

Aren’t they great!

It was a fun day. It’s always great to find some stash on sale!

*I just HAD to post the kitten…they are all just so cute stumbling around here at the house.* 😉

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

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Group Embroidery Project – Summer Creativity Challenge, Marigold Tinting with Crayon Part 6

The Marigold must undergo the Hot Iron! Muwahaha!

One of the most scariest parts of this process of tinting fabric with crayon is the nerve wracking hot iron melting the wax of your freshly colored fabric. If it’s going to go wrong…it’s irreversible from here!

Here is our Marigold flower, waiting for the hot iron to melt the crayon colors on it.

Crayons manage to leave little flecks of waxy color on the surrounding areas colored.

Normally, on a sheet of paper, you could brush them lightly with the back of your hand and scatter them off to your unsuspecting floor. But, with fabric, if you brush the flecks with a large surface, like the back of your hand, you run the risk of smashing the little flecks into your fabric or leaving a streaking crayon stripe across your fabric. So, for fleck removal, I tried a toothbrush. (yes, I have an electric toothbrush, so that is the brush I used.) 😉

There. Once the little flecks of waxy color are removed, to the best of your ability, then you are ready to iron the waxy colors into the fabric. Here you may be able to see that the little flecks are a little less visible. (Right)

Now, heat your iron to the cotton setting. Place your colored design between 2 sheets of paper.

Place the hot iron down on the design. Smell hot wax melting!

And…voila! After lifting the iron, you will see a waxy mess left of the top sheet of paper. Keep replacing this paper until and iron again, until the wax residue no long shows on the paper. Here you can see the wax residue lessening as each pass of the hot iron removes more wax.

Here is our Marigold flower all ironed and tinting with crayon!

Here are the before and after iron shots. You can see that the highlights soften after ironing.

Now, it’s now ready to stitch. Off to select the palette and create some stitches!

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

————-Helpful Information———-

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 1 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 2 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 3 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 4 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 5 (Click Here)

Find Yahoo!Group Hand Embroidery (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Blog (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Summer Creativity Challenge (Click Here)

Find Stitchy Britches Blog (Click Here)

Find Giggleface Studios tutorial for tinting with crayons (Click Here)

Find Craftster forum with tinting with crayons information (Click Here)

Group Embroidery Project – Summer Creativity Challenge, Coloring the Marigold Part 5

Time for some crayons!

Yesterday the flowers ironed on fairly well with the iron on transfer pencil that I found.

Now, the creative challenge is to figure out the colors for the Marigold. Let’s tint this felt flower with some crayons. ( I use Crayola regular crayons )

My inspiration for the Marigold was this photo online: found at: http://desktoppub.about.com/library/photos/blflower3.htm

Image courtesy of Jacci Howard Bear http://desktoppub.about.com/

From this photo, select a few crayons that may be representative of the petal colors. Here you can see a deep red, an orange, a brighter orange, a yellow and a purple for shading. Scribble a few samples until you are happy with the color combinations.

Color the petals. Here I’ve used the crayons to gradually move from the darker tones in the center of the petals to the lighter tones toward the edge of the petals.

I couldn’t see with just the red transfer outline, so I gave up and lightly relined the iron on with a Micron Pigma Pen .005 in black.

Here are all the petals colored with crayon. You also see, circled, the scribble for the stamen colors. Try out a few choices on paper then select one you like.

Here are the colors for the stamen; a bright light yellow, medium yellow, a brown and purple again for shading. Circle above on the paper is the selection for the petal colors.

Here is the entire Marigold flower head, colored. Both the circled selections show the choices for the petals and the stamen.

Here are a few selections for the leaves. They are “warm greens” to match the oranges and yellows of the Marigold. You see a light, medium and dark green here.

Here is the colored Marigold. Purple is the shade color, not black. When I learned to paint, I learned that shadows are really a mixture of 2 neighboring colors. The best choice, when that is not available, is purple. Black, they say, doesn’t really exist in nature and a purple hue is really perceived as ‘darker’ than a black shade. So, I use purple for shading. It seems to work well. 😉

Here is the Marigold in all it’s color glory. On the left you can see where I’ve added pure white highlights to the petals and just a touch on the one leaf. The white is really bright right now, but when you iron the crayon to create the tint, the white will soften.

Now, it’s off to the iron to melt the wax and see what “tint” will be left in the Marigold before choosing the embroidery thread for the stitching!

This is a really fun project. I really like it.

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

————-Helpful Information———-

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 1 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 2 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 3 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 4 (Click Here)

Find Yahoo!Group Hand Embroidery (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Blog (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Summer Creativity Challenge (Click Here)

Find Stitchy Britches Blog (Click Here)

Find Giggleface Studios tutorial for tinting with crayons (Click Here)

Find Craftster forum with tinting with crayons information (Click Here)

Group Embroidery Project – Summer Creativity Challenge, Iron On the Flowers Part 4

The iron on transfers for the Pansy, Marigold, Rose and Iris were successful! …Okay, somewhat successful.

😉

Since we have the larger design of 4″x6″ over the smaller felt fabric of 3″x4.5″, placing the design over the fabric is a little tricky. I held it up to the light, shown in the previous post HERE, just prior to placing the items down on the towel to be ironed.

Hold the hot iron transfer patterns in place while reaching for the hot iron.

Hold the iron down to the transfer. I didn’t move the iron around much. I thought it might ‘blur’ the final image. So, I just let the iron sit on different areas of the design.

The trickiest part is “the peek”. While still holding the iron in place, try to lift a corner or section of the hot iron transfer up in order to peek under the design to see if the iron on pencil is successful. Here you can see that the transfer is very light onto the white felt. But, um…hey?! Isn’t it awfully DARK on the towel! Just my luck…it transferred really well to the protective fabric and not to the embroidery fabric. 😐

After peeking and seeing what resembles a transfer line, go ahead and remove the iron and the iron on transfer pattern. Hopefully, there will be a wonderful outline left on the embroidery fabric. Here, again, you can see the wonderfully DARK lines left on the toweling and the somewhat visible lines left on my embroidery fabric, felt.

Here you can see the size difference in the iron on transfer design and the actual design area of felt fabric. As you can see, only a portion of the iron on design in captured on the surface to be embroidered…the rest, of course…is…

beautifully left all over the towel that was under the fabric! 😉

And there you have it. Designs, transferred to some little felt fabric. Now…the next challenge…

what to do with them NOW?!

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

————-Helpful Information———-

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 1 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 2 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 3 (Click Here)

Find Yahoo!Group Hand Embroidery (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Blog (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Summer Creativity Challenge (Click Here)

Find Stitchy Britches Blog (Click Here)

Find Giggleface Studios tutorial for tinting with crayons (Click Here)

Find Craftster forum with tinting with crayons information (Click Here)

Group Embroidery Project – Summer Creativity Challenge, Preparing Iron On Transfers Part 3

Create outside of the box.

I chose the largest design copy, the 4″x6″, to place onto the3″x4.5″ felt rectangle. How is that you ask? The design doesn’t fit on the rectangle?! I know. At least it doesn’t fit entirely on the rectangle.

The entire design won’t fit onto the felt. By moving the felt piece around behind the design, you can capture a portion of the design that may be pleasing within the design space. Here is the felt piece behind the design of the iris.

Here is the felt piece behind the design of the marigold.

Here is the felt piece behind the design of the pansy.

I’m not sure why I don’t have a picture of the felt behind the rose design. I think I forgot to snap a picture of it.

Now to make a transfer. There are many suggestions for creating a transfer. I wanted something quick and easy. For me, that translates to an iron on pencil or pen. I’ve looked at every store with craft supplies here in Hawaii (Oahu) and have not found an iron on pencil or pen. If you find one here let me know where it is. I managed to coerce my mom into letting me borrow her light table. (She uses it for card making.) So, with this in my hot little hands, an iron on transfer can be born.

Here is the 4″x6″ iris on the light table, design side up, just so you can see the design and the size comparison.

Flip the design over, face down on the light source.

I also dug up a Tri-Chem red transfer pencil that was in with my mom’s old sewing kit. I’m not sure if it’s all that great, but it’s all I have in the way of iron on transfer pencils right now. Beggars can’t be choosers, or so I hear.

With the designs all face down on the light table, trace the design on the backside of the design paper. This leaves the iron on pencil to be placed on your design fabric. I’ve traced all the flower designs onto the back of the original designs.

Now to place and iron the sections of design onto the 3″x4.5″ felt rectangles.

I hope it works!

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

————-Helpful Information———-

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 1 (Click Here)

Find my Summer Creativity Challenge Part 2 (Click Here)

Find Yahoo!Group Hand Embroidery (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Blog (Click Here)

Find Hand Embroidery Group Summer Creativity Challenge (Click Here)

Find Stitchy Britches Blog (Click Here)

Find Giggleface Studios tutorial for tinting with crayons (Click Here)

Find Craftster forum with tinting with crayons information (Click Here)