Tuesday, February 4, 2025

February is National Embroidery Month!

 

 Since this month is national embroidery month I put all my embroidery patterns at Etsy on sale at 20% off. Above is a new one I just listed. It's called Pocket of Hope. The little pocket is made to hold a memento, small photo, or a folded piece of paper. Perfect for a gift with a wish or prayer written on it!

Directions to put it on a quilt are also included.


The sale runs thru March 1.

Saturday, January 25, 2025

Finally my free embroidery for Jan.

 Ok, This will be very different from any others I've posted. I have 3 crazy quilt wall hangings I've been working on and then ignoring for years. I decided to get out the smallest one and work on it with you. Below is the basic pattern on how I laid out the fabrics. I started with no pattern and just sewed them as I worked.The actual size is 14" x 14". Some of the areas are already embroidered so there's no full pic yet because I want you to be surprised each month.

I call this piece "Bali in the Woods" because I used all Bali fabric in tans and greens except for the 2 blue sections. The chart below has where you should put the colors. You can skip the tans and use all greens but do use blue fabric where it's marked. These will be ponds. You need 4 different greens, 1 tan, 1 darker tan or light brown, and the blue. The fabric I used in space 9 is green, tan, and light brown. Use what you like but stay away from bold prints. One of my greens has a palm frond design (4 & 11). The rest look like hand dyed fabrics. 

The 3 pages of patterns were traced from my finished design so they are only approximate. You need to cut the fabric about 1" bigger than the patterns. The areas along the edge of the design may need about 1 1/2" - 2" because you want them to come to the edge of the base fabric. I used a piece of 14" x 14" muslin for this. Each space is numbered to show which piece of fabric is sewn on when. If you don't know how to crazy quilt there are tons of sites and videos to get you started. 

For sections 6 & 7 and 9 & 10, you sew them together then sew them to the main piece. Some sections will need to be hand sewn in place.

Notice that in section 3 there is an option piece. This is because I added a tiny fairy from a piece of fabric after I had sewn all the sections on the base fabric. Maybe you have a tiny scrap of a favorite fabric you'd like to add here.

A BIG tip I have is to baste the edge of the entire piece under after all the pieces are sewn on. Fold under what you plan on for the seam allowance. This is so none of your embroidery gets too close to the edge. I had this problem a few times in section 4 so that's when I did the basting.


The small print will let you know which pieces to sew together before sewing them to the base fabric, what colors to use where, and other tips. This is not a full size pattern.

These patterns below are only approximate as I made this as I went. You may want to combine areas 6&7 and 9&10 into just one fabric, that will be fine. . Remember that when you cut out the fabric to not cut them the size of the patterns. You  need seam allowances!The jpgs are full size so right click them to save them to your hard drive and then print.






Crazy quilting is a fun way to use up leftover pieces of fabric. Just remember that this mini quilt is woodland or garden themed. Next month will be the center section 1. This pond is edged in brown ric-rac and will have goldfish!

If you have no interest in crazy quilting do the embroidery as blocks.


©Billie Jo Heisler 2025

All rights reserved

 Disclaimer:

I drew this design by hand then used a software program to edit it. I have not knowingly copied anyone else's work.

Please consider the drawing and all of the embroidery copyrighted. You have my permission to print copies of the drawing in any size for your own use but not to share or sell. If you want to share the pattern please link to the blog pages.

What I did with the 2023 embroideries

 



Here's both sides of the tote I put the embroideries on. I finish this back in Nov but never took a pic till now. I had planned on doing some embroidery where the blocks join but got to the point where it became just get it done. I carry a lot of totes when I go shopping. Have you seen the tv series Elsbeth?  I get like her but my totes look full where as the ones she carries look empty.

I'm going to do a second post with what I have planned for the free embroidery. It's very different this year.

Tuesday, December 31, 2024

This is my tradition at the holidays

 No I don't lose a Kevin or go caroling. For me it's either the flu, a bad cold, or both. This year it's both. Just when I started felling better after the flu, the head cold hit. On tv I saw a report about holiday allergies getting bad due to all the decorations. I figured that out long ago when I realized my allergies got really bad when getting all the decorations up from the basement. We have a damp one and run a dehumidifier but it can only help so much. After that I moved everything but the outdoor dec and the tree to a closet upstairs. The tree would get a shower every year before setting it up. Now I have a 2 foot tree that can be stored in the closet so no more explaining why there is a tree in the shower drip drying.

This was a pretty bad year with so much needing fixed but so was 2023. Guess that's what happens when stuff gets old. The main TV broke right after Thanksgiving and it was bought in 2018. That's not really old is it?

I keep wondering what brought on 2 years of bad luck? Did I break a mirror or do some other thing to attract it? In the past month we lost 4 of our ducks and the one rooster we ended up with. Ru was a small bantam and he became a pet. He was named for Ru Paul because when he was a peep the other ones pecked his head till he was bald. In this photo you can see he was still growing his head feathers.


I do have new free designs for 2025 but it will take me a few weeks to get the first up.

Let's all hope for a better year!