Quilting Daze

Embroidery Bliss

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please scroll down for edit

Time was getting away from me! It was time to trace and stitch the first installment of "Raggedy and Friends" by my good friend Kaaren at The Painted Quilt for my good friend Carol at Brown Quilts 4 Me.
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During my Schnibblemania I was chatting with Yvette at BOM Quilter and I noticed on her blog that she'd used Transfer-Eze to do an embroidery project. We discussed how much she loved it and that I would too.
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Transfer-Eze and I are now very good friends - I LOVE this stuff.

In January I visited a craft show and Bird Brains Designs had their adorable booth set up. I took my time visiting and discovered a package of Transfer-Eze. I read the package and it just sounded way too good to be true so I put it back and went along my merry way. Mind you for a couple of months I kept thinking about it and then discovered that I could buy one 'try me' sheet from Bird Brain Designs. So, the next time I placed an order I added a 'try me' sheet to my shopping cart. When it arrived I put it in a safe place - still experiencing serious doubts about it. LOL
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After chatting with Yvette I decided to try it with Kaaren's Raggedy & Friends larger block. I really don't mind tracing my embroidery projects but sometimes it's really a daunting task. And, when it's a daunting task I have a tendency to procrastinate. It was time to just do it - I put the design on the bed of my printer/copier, loaded the single sheet of Transfer Eze and hit the print button (keeping my fingers crossed - LOL)

The Results

The design printed a bit light but that's easily rectified in the future. After it's printed you peel off the paper backing and adhere it to your fabric.
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Time to Stitch

Time to stitch. I feared that my needle and floss would drag when I pulled it through to make my first stitches but it didn't. I also feared that it would be too stiff to put in my preferred spring hoop but it worked just fine. I was a very happy stitcher. WooHoo!!!!
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Removing Transfer-Eze

When I finished stitching it was time to remove the Transfer-Eze film. Once you're finished stitching you're to pull away and cut away the excess film and then put the whole thing in water - the remaining film is suppose to dissolve. I started pulling it away from the fabric - didn't come up as easily as I'd hoped and I detected a sticky residue. At this point I was getting a bit concerned. :-o
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The Dunking of Annie & Andy

As soon as Annie and Andy were dunked in the water the remaining Transfer-Eze dissolved away and there was no sticky residue. Wahoo - time to dance!!!! I was a very happy girl.

EDIT: Kaaren made a very good point in her comment here about using overdyed threads - it's been my experience that they are not colorfast. Putting your stitched project in water may cause your floss to run. That would be a disaster so please be very careful. I feared that my red floss might run but thankfully it didn't.

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The Finish

They are so stinkin' cute - aren't they? teehee

After I pressed the larger block I realized that I failed to do the running stitch around the design - Oh No! I'll send a skein of floss with the blocks and I'm sure Carol won't mind adding the stitches. :-)

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Did I mention that I LOVE Transfer-Eze? :-) I plan to place an order for a package of Transfer-Eze from Bird Brain Designs very soon. I don't anticipate using Transfer-Eze for every embroidery project but I will use it more often than not.

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Kaaren's second installment should be available on August 20th and I can hardly wait. :-) Yvette, thank you so much for encouraging me to try Transfer-Eze.
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Have a fabulous Tuesday. I appreciate your visit.

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In Friendship