Have you ever been to an Anita Goodesign Embroidery Party? If you haven’t you are missing out on tons of fun! What better place can you imagine than a room filled with beautiful top of the line embroidery machines surrounded with happy and excited sewing & embroidery enthusiasts? All gathered together in one place to learn and be inspired by one of embroidery’s best, Steve Wilson from Anita Goodesign!
In Everett, this past week the Anita Goodesign Embroidery Party was two days of total fun. There were seven projects to enjoy and everyone left with a CD of all the designs used so we can make as many as we like. Of course, all of the projects were great, but a couple of my favorite techniques that we learned were Three-Dimensional Flowers, a Christmas Stocking completely in the hoop, and Shaped Edge Tea Towels.
Steve brings so many wonderful samples for us to see, touch, and be inspired by, every where you look there is something beautiful. He also gave us a sneak peak of the designs that will be coming out in the next few months—they are really neat!
One of my most favorite things about this Party was getting to meet wonderful folks who love to sew just as much as I do. I came away so energized and inspired. Check out the fun we had in the video below:
A friend of mine and I participate in a ladies tea each year. There is a friendly competition to see who can have the most elaborate and the most beautiful table for 8. Each year we change the color and the flowers. This year we wanted to do a very colorful table and after I saw the 3D Flowers CD in the 3D Lace Embellishment Kit, we decided to create the centerpiece. Our table was beautiful. I love the design collection because the creative opportunities are endless. From Lace flowers to jewelry and handbags, the options are fantastic! My friend Nannette has an interest in making hats and has collected antique buttons and flower centers from the 30′s and 40′s. That’s what you see in the centers of the lacy flowers. We experimented with the new Heat N Shrink stabilizer from Floriani for the large blue flowers which caused them to crinkle up nicely. We used Hoop Ease and Organdy for the pink and white flowers. We added a little greenery from her yard and what you see in the photo was beautiful. I look forward to creating many more flowers because I ran out of time and only got to use two the many designs. My friend took this picture for me as she is quite fond of our flowers and tells me she intends to keep them.
We recently hosted the Love of Sewing Retreat with special guest Nancy Zieman at the Puyallup Fairgrounds. This was a unique opportunity for our customers and employees alike as Nancy only presents four sewing retreats a year. The event was a success and I think everyone had fun!
Two of Nancy’s samples that inspired me the most were the Trace n’ Create Lone Star Quilt Template and Trace n’ Create Dresden Quilt Template. These templates are fantastic because you can create a 36″ block in the same time it takes to make a standard size quilt block. Using these Trace n’ Create templates, you are able to make a 12″,24′ 32″ or 36″ quilt block. It takes just as much time to make a 36′ block as it does a 12″ block. Either one of these large blocks would work well to create a queen size quilt in no time using a quilting machine!
Using Nancy’s “No-pivot Method”, you will never use traditional methods again!
With the templates, you have perfect points every time!
The Holiday Sew Fun Open Houses were recently completed at all of our stores. What a wonderful fun-filled three weeks! While not able to attend each open house, I loved the ones I attended. I heard great reports from the Sew Fun Consultants that were at other Open Houses.
Do you know we have the most talented customers? It’s true, and your show and tells prove it. One after another, the items you brought to share with others showed creativity, talent and expressed lots of love. I’d have loved to hide everyone of the items in my purse to take home to enjoy over and over, but somehow I think you would have noticed they were missing!
I hope you had as much fun as I did at our Open Houses. They were a great start to the Holiday Season. Happy New Year to you all!
Lauri K.
Education Manager
To view the full Sew Fun Open House Photo Albums, please visit the Quality Sewing & Vacuum Facebook page and Click on the Photos tab.
We recently posted a blog about stitchable teddy bears…stuffed bears that are specially designed to be embroidered on. These teddies have been a hot selling item this holiday season. Gayle, a reader of our blog shared with us her success story with these bears and included pictures of the bears that she stitched for the children in her family.
“I recently purchased 9 of these teddy bears to do for all the kids in the family for Christmas. I wanted to use the 5×7 hoop and make larger pictures plus personalize adding each child’s name. So I did this by removing the stuffing in the head also. Then I hooped everything; stabilizer, bear and topping. They were difficult to get hooped but with patience it can be done and they turned out adorable. I’m anxious now to see the kids open them. Each had a theme – one child played football for the first time this year so his had a football player on it with his team colors, others were soccer players, the two girls are in high school so I put cheerleaders on theirs in their school colors. Great gift ideas!”- Gayle
These bears turned out great, thank you for sharing these pictures with us Gayle! I am sure the kids in her family will be delighted to receive these bears. I love that each teddy has been customized to fit each child’s particular interest. I would have loved to receive a bear with my name on it when I was a little girl!
Do you have any inspirational show and tells you would like to share with our readers? Email us your comments and pictures info@shopqualitysewing.com.
This is the 25th year of business for Quality Sewing & Vacuum Centers. To commemorate our anniversary we had Quality Sewing & Vacuum sweatshirts made. We love the creative embroidery and embellishing we have seen on them. If you have embellished your Quality Sewing Sweatshirt and would like to share, email a photo of it to carmen@qualitysewing.com and I will post it our blog. Show and tell is so fun, we love it when you share!
Happy Sewing, Carmen
Sweatshirt Jacket by Anne from Issaquah
Quilted Sweatshirt by Mary from Everett
Quilted Sweatshirt Back by Mary from Everett
Embroidered Sweatshirt Front by Jenny in Issaquah
Embroidered Sweatshirt Back by Jenny in Issaquah
Update: 8/1/2010
Customer Midge made her twin Grandaughters adorable sweatshirts and I had to share the photos! Aren’t they cute?
