Saving Money With Your Sewing Machine - Yes It Can Easily Be Done

If you want to save money then there are many things that you can do with a sewing machine. Of course the most obvious thing that you can do is to repair your family's clothes. This can save you a lot of money in buying new clothes when the old ones are not really all that bad. Of course you do not want to have clothes that are not going to look good, but if you are good with the machine then you can at least keep them looking good for a bit longer than they would have. It is also possible to save money with a sewing machine by buying in thrift stores as then you can always alter clothes that were not the right size and it allows you to have a wider choice in the store. The same is true of curtains, if you can alter them yourself then you can save a lot of money.

You can also make money with a sewing machine. If you have friends that are not so good with a sewing machine, then you can offer to do their repairs for them. If you do a good job then you will be much more likely to get more work as people recommend you to their friends. Then you could have a real business going. Not as much as a proper job maybe, but there are a lot of people that are not able to go out to work that are looking for a way to raise their income. If you have a sewing machine then it might be a good way to earn some extra cash. There are always people that need things altering and even if you only do simple things you might still be able to make some money.

If you are quite good with a sewing machine then you can make money from craft fairs.There is quite a good market for home made quilts and other items and if you can buy the cloth to make them from , you can make quite a good bit of extra money by doing craft items. It is a good market and the best thing is that you are your own boss. You decide what you are going to make and when you are going to work. If you have a good sewing machine then there are lots of ways that you can save money and even make some extra money as well.

For more information on sewing machine parts, sewing machines for sale, heavy duty sewing machines, Singer sewing machines and wholesale sewing machines please visit ShoppingForSewingMachines.info.

Interesting Facts on Cross Stitch Embroidery

What exactly is cross stitch embroidery : Cross-stitch is one of the oldest forms of embroidery and is famous amongst enthusiasts across the world. Many folk museums show examples of clothing decorated with cross-stitch, especially from continental Europe and Asia. Cross-stitch is a popular form of counted-thread embroidery in which X-shaped stitches are used to form a picture.

There are two different stitching techniques commonly used in Cross Stitch Embroidery.

The first, the "stab" method, is used by most beginning stitchers. The stab method involves moving the hand back and forth from the front of the fabric to the back of the fabric. The needle is "stabbed" into the front of the fabric, left there, and then pulled through from the other side. The second, the "Sewing" method is a favourite of stitchers who prefer to hold the fabric in the hand instead of hoop.

Each stitch technique has unique characteristics. The stab method is effective when using a hoop or frame. The stab method of stitching does not distort the fabric. It is easy to make certain that the stitch is placed properly. In the sewing method, the stitcher's hand and needle stay on top of the fabric, except when securing floss. The needle scoops under the weave of the fabric. Since this requires practice, the sewing method is not the best for beginners. It is more difficult to ensure stitch placement, and the fabric can be distorted by the scooping motion. For more experienced stitchers, this sewing technique is preferred for some projects because a hoop is not required and the speed is considerably faster.

Some forms of Cross Stitch :
Here we introduce you to some of the common and famous forms of cross stitch : Counted cross-stitch is unique since this involves actual counting of each of the stitches. Cross-stitch is done on designs printed on the canvas, showing every single cross (stamped cross-stitch)."

Two-dimensional (unshaded) cross-stitch in floral and geometric patterns, usually worked in black and red cotton floss on linen, is characteristic of folk embroidery in Eastern and Central Europe.

Multicoloured, shaded, painting-like patterns as we know them today are a recent development, deriving from similar shaded patterns of Berlin wool work of the mid-nineteenth century

Cross-stitch is the most popular form of hobby embroidery in the western world. It lends itself well to recreational use, as it is easy to learn and very versatile.

In the United States, the earliest known cross-stitch sampler is currently housed at Pilgrim Hall in Plymouth, Massachusetts (Pilgrim Hall).The sampler was created by Loara Standish, the daughter of Captain Myles Standish, circa 1653.

Traditionally, cross-stitch was used to embellish items like dishcloths, household linens, and doilies (only a small portion of which would actually be embroidered). Although there are many cross-stitchers who still employ it in this fashion, especially in Europe, it is now more popular to simply embroider plain pieces of canvas and hang them on the wall for decoration. There are many cross-stitching "guilds" across the United States and Europe which offer classes, collaborate on large projects, stitch for charity, and provide other ways for local cross-stitchers to get to know one another.

Embroidery Designs Guide

Hand Embroidery Designs

Amazing Embroidery Designs

Know-How of Machine Embroidery

It can be (Machine embroidery) as simple as selecting wonderful design, inserting the design card into the machine, hooping the fabric and pushing a button. But if one aims to manufacture good-looking garments with soft, flexible embroidery, there is much one should know.

Even the fabrics like silks and soft wools can be machine-embroidered. But manufacturing elegant embroidery, which is well matched with the fabric, doesn't wrinkle, or alter the fabric's drape, includes the relations of all the following essentials: a machine that's well-adjusted and placed at the suitable needle and bobbin tensions, a well-equipped and located design, the exact needle and thread for the job, and a sound knowledge of the fabric being embroidered therefore it's properly hooped and stabilized. The article will discuss these fundamentals, but the content will focus on how to select designs and fabrics that are suited with each other and tell what to do when they are not.

Good Design & Digitising in Embroidery

Good design and digitising need some excellent ingredients like production friendliness, proper pathing, proper underlay, a balance of stitch count and detail.

Production friendliness means designs must be visually pleasant; but it is more crucial that they must be sewn fast and proficiently. Customers have to understand this serious matter: by giving a little more money for good digitising, they save their money by reducing machine time.

Though, techniques of Proper Pathing are difficult to master, it is the foundation of effective designs. Proper pathing is complicated in terms of many concerned variables, including the type of fabric, the design's foreground and background. Proper underlay is unseen but it is a significant part of a design. Underlay helps perfect the look of design and it also enables you to loosen your high compactness that decreases total stitch count and helps designs run better. Proper digitising is the result of good placing of underlay concerning the top stitch. The break wall of underlay prevents the top stitching from sticking to the fabric or stitching bottom.

A balance of stitch count and detail helps digitising demonstrates detail without producing a mess of stitches. Manufacturers must not forget that the thread has a mass of 1 mm; therefore they should allow the viewer to fill in the design's space with his mind's eye. After all, designs are generally viewed from a certain distance.

Designs with high compactness are likely to become impenetrable and rough to the person wearing the garment. Manufacturers should reduce the densities with developing coats of embroidery. They must consider the suppleness of fabric when a manufactured sample does not please eyes of viewers.

There are many features connected with good digitising; these are clean lettering, efficient artwork modification, importance of push/pull issues, knowledge of stitch length and type, correct tie-ins and tie-outs, successful blending, a good perception of when to use or not use automatic software functions and other factors.

Compatible Design and Fabric

Fabric features, its proposed usages and the particulars of design form a winning combination of fabric and design. But there are some hurdles, which should be coped with. Manufacturers must take care if the design's stitch density would alter the hand of the fabric. If yes, this should not become a problem in your project. Then the effects of colour, weight and texture of fabric on design should be examined. If manufacturer is able to obtain good results by using backing and topping, simple change of thread colours might make the fabric and design work together. Modifying design to make it work or selecting design might prove an unwelcome option.

Stabilizing the fabric

When high-speed embroidery is concerned, knit is taken as unstable fabric. A cut-away stabilizer is the solution to design stability while the design is being embroidered and it stays behind the embroidery pattern all through the life of the garment.

. A fusible or non-fusible cut-away stabilizer in a weight harmonizes the fabric weight. Extremely heavy stabiliser makes the designs stiff; on the other hand a stabilizer, which is incredibly light will enhance the probability of the design cupping and wrinkling.

Various coatings of lightweight cut-away stabiliser are advised for heavyweight knit and grade the stabiliser layers after embroidering. This will stop extra volume behind the design and next to the body.

. Used with knits, a tear-away stabiliser may draw back from the design during embroidery, creating design deformation and mismatched figures.

. Combine knit tricot bordering to the fabric incorrect side under the embroidery region so that fabric stretch can be stabilised before hooping. Knit tricot interfacing has the same cross-grained stretch as the fashion knit, so combine the interfacing stretch perpendicular to the knit fabric stretch. Remember that cut-away stabilizer is still essential even though interfacing is used to hold the fabric.

. To prevent misaligned outlines, forward through the design and stitch the outline first to secure all the layers together, using a thread colour that goes with the fabric. Then embroider the design from the beginning, re-stitching the outline in sequence

Backing and Topping are Fabric stabilizers

Backing

Backing, as the name denotes, gives support and structure placed under the item or fabric being embroidered; it is a woven or non-woven material. Backings are available in various density and patterns.

Use of Backing

Backing is used to support the item being embroidered; it handles the stitches being applied to the fabric or item being sewn. Backing gives an additional support to prevent distortion of the design being sewn. Manufacturers are always in dilemma which backing they should apply to improve the quality of products. The most important rule for embroidery is to stabilise the fabric. Manufacturers use backing to stabilise the design sewn on the garment. Stabiliser works as the foundation of design and everyone knows that any project or work will come out wrong without having a good foundation. The same principle is applicable to embroidery also. If a builder wants to erect a skyscraper, he has to make the foundation strong. The requirement of backing is in proportion to the number of stitches of design. If the backing is lightweight, four layers are more than enough. Some common sense might be useful at this moment. Multiple layers of backing are better than one layer of heavier backing.

Topping

Toppers keep the stitches above the surface. There are various kinds of toppings like water-soluble, coloured vinyl or matching organza. Put the topper over the design region and use the machines' fix/baste function to support it in place during embroidery. Toppers can be taken off by carefully cutting or eliminating according to the directives of the manufacturers. Organza topper can be taken off by holding it tight above the design and cut close to the design edge using sharp, curved scissors. The organza cut edge will vanish back into the fabric, but will stay under the design for firmness.

Designs

Light and airy designs are perfect for knit fabrics. Even after selecting the ideal stabilizer, the knits might be curled, cupped or distorted by solid, dense designs.

Designs must be selected according to the weight of knit. Simple, less dense or outline designs are advisable for lightweight knits. If a thick design is embroidered on a lightweight knit, the fabric that hems in design will be overburdened. A design with more detailing but not excessively dense works best for sweatshirting and other heavyweight knits.

Floating appliqu?s responds well to machine embroidery designs, which are preprogrammed. Manufacturers must consider how the designs stitch out prior to selecting designs. The stitches must hold themselves even after the stabilizer is detached, hence the design should start with running stitches and then have satin stitches added to support the design. All the stitched areas must connect to retain the design shape.

Occasionally, the stitches in a design appear to be totally connected, but when the stabilizer is removed, the embroidery falls apart. If in doubt about the design's stability, sandwich a layer of sheer fabric, such as organdy, organza or tulle, with the water-soluble stabilizer prior to stitching. After the stabilizer is removed, carefully trim away any fabric outside the design area

The same procedure can be used if the appliqu? has open areas in the design. To ensure the sheer fabric in the appliqu? won't show, select a colour close to the garment it will be placed on.

Puckering

If your design is 4" square, use the size hoop closest to the size of the design. Fabric can be distorted by extra large hoop used during the embroidery procedure. Puckering appears on the design when the fabric is unhooped. Fabric must be hooped tightly not rigidly. Too taut of fabric could result in the stretching of the fabric and will cause the same result - puckering of the fabric around the design. Adjusting the size of the hoop before the last hooping is also significant. First, set the screw on your hoop just about where you think it should be for the layers of stabilizer and fabric. Then, try to hoop your fabric - continue hooping and unhooping until you have the perfect tension. Never adjust the screw on the hoop after hooping your fabric with the stabilizer. This action will cause the fabric to shift in the hoop and ultimately cause puckering of the fabric around designs.

Distortion

Achievement of desired results is relied on proper selection and use of stabilizer. Design will create distortion in the fabric on which the design is being stitched out. If the distortion is not reduced, it can cause misalignments of the design outline as well as other features. If misaligned features or gaps in between fills create troubles, the problem is most likely a result of improper choice and use of stabilizer or poor hooping method.

Applying perfect stabilizer can minimize fabric distortion that occurs as the design is being stitched out. The quality of the finished work is much affected by both the type of stabilizer used and technique used to attach the fabric to the stabilizer. The distortion of design depends on the density of stabilizer; it is also significant to take in that there is a strong relationship between connection of fabric to the stabilizer and tendency of its movement while the design is being stitched out. All of designs incorporate underlay stitching which facilitates the fabric to get linked with the underlying stabilizer. Using either adhesive sprays or stabilizers such as Wet N Set, which include some form of adhesive, can often further improve this union between the fabric and stabilizer.

Fabric Coverage

Poor coverage is the result of loose stitches and one can see through the embroidery stitching. Other things like colour or texture, thread selection, enlarging the design, or even personal preference cause poor fabric coverage. This poor result can be corrected by digitizing with proper stitch choice, with more stitches and underlay stitches and with the help of suitable backing and topping. A topping like Coverup can be used to prevent poor coverage. The proper colour has the ability to cancel the influences of coloured or printed fabrics and can control the pile of fabric quickly.

Designs, which are enlarged on some embroidery system lengthens the stitches and extends the spacing between them. Such designs do not protect fabric as well as their unscaled corresponding parts. Put gold lam? as topping if the customizing software lengthens the stitches and widens the rows. The spaces generated from elongating the stitches will have the sparkling lam? peeping through, and you may even generate a more remarkable effect than the first design. Fabric coverage is also influenced by personal choice. Expectation of total coverage of fabric, not considering thread-colour selections gives birth to inflexible embroidery, which expert embroiderers and digitizers consider to be of poor quality - and which will probably cause other troubles like puckering, thread breaks or even fabric damage.

Misalignment

Tearaway backing with a design, which has ample fill regions, can cause inferior registration like gapping or misaligned outlines. These designs can crash a tearaway and weaken the stability before the figure has been totally sewn. To solve this problem, use only a cutaway backing or stuck with embroidery spray paste.

Poor registration can be resulted from excessively stiff tensions also. Such situation makes you loosen your bobbin and upper thread tensions to put it right. Roughly woven fabric threads may create what might come out to be inferior registration. By deflecting the needle to one side of the fabric threads, the fabric fibres can create bumpy edges. Stable and smooth-finish fabric is ideal for clean-edged effects.

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PE-Design Embroidery Digitizing Software: Getting Started

What is PE-Design?

PE-Design is an embroidery digitizing software system available from Brother dealers and though the 'PE' stands for Personal Embroidery, don't let that fool you. It's a robust system that allows for some pretty advanced digitizing and embroidery and is an excellent program to begin learning the art of embroidery digitizing. The Graphical User Interface (GUI) or What-You-See/Interact-With-On-The-Screen is colorful with large, intuitive buttons and fly-outs. It's also organized very well with no clutter for a large workspace.

PE-Design allows the digitizer to convert a digital picture to stitches and save it in a format that can be read by the computer in your embroidery machine. The image can be one you've hand drawn and scanned, one created in another imaging program such as Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, or JASC Paint Shop Pro, one you've captured (legally, of course) from the Internet, a CD or floppy, or a digital snapshot from your digital camera. Whatever the case, the original image must be in .jpg, .gif or .bmp format.

The PE-Design full product package includes a card reader/writer. It must be plugged into a USB port in order for the program to run. Though you can install the program on any machine, it can only function on the machine where the reader/writer is installed.

Once you've created your design, you can save it in Brother (*.PES), Husqvarna/Viking (*.HUS), Melo (*.EXP), Tajima (*.DST) and Pfaff (*.PCS) formats. It is a Brother product, so its native format is PES.

What Does It Cost?

The program will probably run you somewhere between $1,000.00 and $1,200.00, but if you are purchasing an embroidery machine or are a good customer of the shop and don't mind a little dickering, you might be able to negotiate a substantial savings. It never hurts to try. Here's a tip: Before you buy ask your dealer if any major upgrades to the software have been announced. If a major upgrade is forthcoming and you are in no hurry, you may want to postpone your purchase. Major upgrades come with a price, usually in the range of $250.00 to $300.00, and must be purchased from a Brother dealer. Though a major upgrade is usually worth the investment, you don't want to purchase the software one month just to have to shell out more money a few months later. Minor upgrades, from the current version 6.0 to version 6.07 for instance, are free, and are downloaded from the Brother web site.

Commercial or Home-based?

PE-Design is designed with the home-based digitizer and personal embroiderer in mind. That means that many functions or settings are automatic with limited manual control available to the digitizer. Commercial digitizing software is just the opposite: Functions and settings are in the hands of the digitizer and automatic settings can be adjusted and saved. Of course, commercial digitizing software will cost five to twenty times more than PE-Design. Still, in the hands of a skilled and creative digitizer, PE-Design produces excellent embroidery designs.

Beginning to Digitize

As with any sophisticated software be prepared to practice, practice, practice and use your creativity to explore and push the program to its limits. Learn the fundamentals of what makes a design sew out perfectly, then look at the designs you like with an analytical eye. Ask, "How did they do that?" and try to recreate the technique. With time you'll develop your own style and find your digitizing niche.

Many shops offer digitizing classes. Ask to sit in for free on a few before making a time or financial commitment. If all the instructor does is follow the booklet that came with the software, save your money. You'll probably teach yourself quicker.

Speaking of the manual: It is 262 pages and was obviously written by a team very familiar with PE-Design and the English language. It is well organized with plenty of images and screenshots, is very easy to read and covers the basic use of every tool in depth. It is not a digitizing teacher. Use it to learn the tools, it won't take long, then practice, practice, practice.

The Bottom Line

If you are interested and excited about learning to digitize your own embroidery designs, whether for personal use or to sell, PE-Design is a wonderful way to get started. Its reasonable entry fee and easy to use and learn interface, will allow you to reach new creative heights in all your embroideries.

Deb Schneider is an embroidery design digitizer and PE-Design instructor offering her machine embroidery designs, Redwork designs and appliques on her website: WindstarEmbroidery.com