Whatever happened to May?

I wish I could say I have been SO busy Quilting that I haven't come up for air in a whole month - but actually - I keep getting distracted!


I started the month by Testing out the Scan-n-cut for some possible STENCIL projects.

Here I am using one of Esther Aliu's "Fantasy Flower" stencil patterns that I downloaded a while ago.

The clear line drawing scanned well with just a few tweaks needed to clean up some stray lines and text.

In a matter of minutes I had a precise Freezer Paper stencil cut - in both Negative and Positive.

Seeing it was a test, why not use both?

A word of warning - always adjust your blade depth to suit the thickness of what you are cutting or you may end up cutting a (repairable yet irritating) hole in your mat.

It took longer to find the Fabric Stencil Paint than it did to cut these out!

I think that this was a success and all up (shopping for paint excluded) it took a morning.

***

Once your pattern is saved you can cut out as many copies as needed for your project - enlarge or reduce the size of the Stencil without having to re-scan it!

AND - don't just stop at Stencils... Cut out some Applique too!

Cupcakes for RSPCA day

After last week's Retirement cake, I thought I really should find a solution to my fear of writing on cakes.

I have been using my Brother Scan-n-cut to make Applique for my 'Istanbul' Quilt and recalled that I had also considered using it to make Stencils for Cake decorating.
So when I heard that DH's office was having "Cupcake Day" I thought it a good time to have a practice at Stencilling!

I found some acetate sheets that were originally for an old overhead projector (which still works by the way!) and downloaded a clipart stencil of something I thought would be appropriate.  It took a bit of tweaking but finally I cut out a perfect stencil.

Using leftover Icing to make small cupcake size plaques - I was good to go, and in no time at all I had a dozen 'Purrfect' cake toppers.

Just one small problem -
I discovered much later that DH's office was not raising funds for the RSPCA....

I wonder if there are any Black and Ginger cats in Indigenous literature?


Never  mind whatever the fundraising was for - they got Cupcakes to auction off and I got to practice making stencils!
I call that a WIN-WIN!!

Now where was I?

Now that I have my Mo-jo (and Microsoft Picture Manager) back I will attempt to share my adventures with my Scan-n-cut so far ...

The Scan-n-cut was bought to help with the monotonous tasks of cutting out multiples of applique shapes - hopefully to save my hands as well as my sanity.

All these cut and ready to fuse in 3 and a half minutes!

(Well, maybe not quite THAT quick!)

For this project I am doing raw-edge fusible applique using "Applifix".
I have scanned each of my pieces and then multiplied them by the number required for the 8 repeats needed.

Then it was a simple matter of tweaking the individual pieces into the most economical configuration for both printing/cutting and saving fabric waste.

I have learnt that if you are not 100% confident that your pattern will fit on your fabric (especially if you are working on an off cut) the best thing to do is change to the pen tool and draw the pattern before cutting it out.

Also - if the fabric twists while being cut.
Stop the machine, swap over the blade for a pen and continue by drawing the pattern - you can cut it out / fix it with scissors later.

Like so many other techniques, it takes a bit of time to perfect, but when I was able to cut out and bag up an entire quilt's worth of applique pieces ready to fuse in less than a day - I can see that it was worth spending that time.

And the bonus is, now the pattern is saved in the machine's memory I can repeat each element or part thereof over and over, should I wish to make another of these quilts, or matching cushions/table runner ...

What am I thinking?? - Let's just get this one finished first!

Playing with my 'new' toy ...

Well, it is hardly "New" as I was encouraged most emphatically by my DH to buy it last June!

This "tool for a job" has come into it's own already - helping DS#2 with a University project, but this week I have been putting it through it's paces to
1. Learn how to use it properly and
2. See if it will REALLY cut down the workload for an applique quilt I am about to start.

The Quilt in question is "Istanbul" by Tamsin Harvey.
It will be my first ever Raw-edge applique quilt
AND - as it is a Wedding Quilt - I have to make it carefully and also bigger!

So a LOT of fiddly cutting is ahead of me ... unless this works!

I found it to be more accurate if I copied the original pattern - cut it apart (lots of copies) and removed connecting lines with some good old fashioned Tippex.
OK that dates me - Whiteout, Correction Fluid, Liquid paper - whatever!

Making sure it was TOTALLY dry before putting it through the scanner.

A few tweaks later and I had an Image that drew out beautifully.
(See green drawing on the right of the photo).

Checking the image against the original using a lightbox - looks pretty good!

Now to see whether it will cut out as nicely as it drew!

Retrieve the image from the 'files' section.

Load up the fabric,
press "Cut",
and sit back and watch!

The result?
Not bad at all!

I can now 'copy and paste' the required number of blooms and cut them out in no time at all!


It took a bit of time playing with the machine but it was worth it.
- oh and 'Thought for the day' - if you have one of these machines....
Check the Brother site for any program updates BEFORE you start working on a big project!