A year or so ago, I stitched a couple of black background designs on felt rather than vinyl because the black vinyl was simply too glossy. It looked better, but I just wasn’t happy with the felt I had, so I mostly shelved those designs. But I got a tip about a kind of vinyl […]
Tag: machine embroidery
The Elder Sign
The Cthulhu mythos isn’t exactly a Halloween staple, but I had a request for an Elder Sign so here it is. I have a nice Cthulhu from Urban Threads that I’ve put on valet trays, so I played around with some of the fancy new JoAnn vinyl. Not sure if that’s a colour out of […]
Motel key fobs
Another little freebie: a blank “vintage motel key” design. You can use your embroidery machine’s lettering or purchased alphabets to add a monogram (I used DLB’s Melody alphabet) or imaginary motel’s name. Or just put a fun image on there, or use fancy vinyl. There are three layers in the SVG file. A blank design […]
Space Shuttle icon snap tab
If you follow my Silver Seams Surplus Etsy store, you’ll have seen a few space fabrics turn up. Someone bought a couple, so I needed a little shipping gift to go in. Here’s what I came up with. The file is for five color-sorted tabs in a 4×4 hoop. You’ll notice this has a slightly […]
Adding die lines to embroidery designs with Ink/Stitch
Ink/Stitch on top of Inkscape makes producing a die line for embroidery designs that don’t have them easy. Both pieces of software are free and open-source, and run on Windows, Mac, and Linux.
Snap tray variant style
The older snap tray design has pinched corners, which makes it super-easy to snap – just, well, pinch the corners. But for a different look, here’s one I’ve been playing around with. The snaps show on the inside, so if you’re using fancy ones (or rivets) or just very proud of your color-coordination, this is […]
Color-sorting with Ink/Stitch
When you have a single-color embroidery machine, sometimes you want to sew a bunch of identical items to make the most of your thread changes. But if you just duplicate an item, sometimes your machine wants to stitch each one out in series, defeating the purpose. Pricey embroidery software like Embrilliance will group the colors […]
Pug silhouette (machine embroidery)
“Silhouette” isn’t quite right, since that’d just be a basic fill – this design is a minimalist mix of fill and satin-stitch contour. Whatever that’s called? That’s what this is. Its a bit larger than, say, the Teensy Dragon – a smidge over an inch tall, and a little less than an inch and a […]
Ear savers / Mask extenders
Although I’ve been making my masks with around-the-head elastic, I have found myself wishing for something to give people who have a supply of surgical masks. Which, I’m happy to report, is finally starting to be most of the businesses around here. Enter the ear savers, which snap to the mask loops and go around […]
Monogramming without a font
Or rather, without an embroidery font. You don’t need to buy a whole font if you just need initials or a name. You can just create it in Inkscape. Note: Mr. Baskerville, who taught me typesetting, is currently turning over in his grave at my use of “font” when what I really mean is “font […]