Broiderie Perse Tutorial for Crazy Quilting Part 1

This is part 1 of the Broiderie Perse Tutorial for Crazy Quilting.  Please note, since most crazy quilts are for the sake of visual art rather than utilitarian purposes, we can ease up a bit on the rules that would apply to applique on a traditional sane quilt.

Step 1:  Choose a print.  You'll need a good cotton fabric with well defined flowers, animals, fruit or insects.  In this case, I chose a print with pink peonies.

Step 2: Piece your block in whatever manner you're comfortable with.  I always use the "sew and flip" method.  If you need instructions for that, you can find my tutorial for the "sew and flip" foundation piecing process here.

Step 3:  Determine where you want to add your applique.  As you can see, there's an open area underneath the photo image.  You don't have to leave any space.  I just didn't worry about that space because I knew my flowers were going to go there.

Step 4:  You will need to use some fusible web.  I use light weight fusible web by Pellon.  It's called, Wonder Under.

The fusible web is on a paper backing.

Step 4:  Determine which motif from the cotton print that you want to use and cut around it leaving a good inch or more.  Cut a piece of the fusible web a little bit larger than the cotton fabric.

Step 5:  Look closely at your fusible web.  The paper side is smooth and fusible side has a rough feel to it.  Make sure that the wrong side of the fabric is against the fusible side of the Pellon.

Step 6:  Cut the excess fusible web away so that it is the same size as the cotton print.  If you don't do this, you'll have glue on your fabric, your iron and your ironing board.

Step 7:  Again, double check to make sure that the back side of your print is against the fusible side of the Pellon.  Line the 2 pieces up and press with your iron on a medium setting or follow the directions included with the Pellon.

This piece is now fused.  In the above photo, you're seeing the paper side of the Pellon.  The right side of the cotton print in laying against the cutting board.

Step 8: Do not pull the paper off yet.  Using a very sharp pair of scissors, carefully cut the flower motif out from the fabric.

Step 9: Once you have your flower motif cut out, you can carefully peal away the backing paper from your applique.  The glue should now be on the back of your cotton print.

Step 10: Play around a little bit to see where you want your applique.  I knew when I started where I wanted it but be sure it's positioned exactly as you please because once you iron it on, it's there to stay.

Step 11: When you're satisfied with the position of your applique, go ahead and iron it on using a medium heat on your iron or follow the manufacturers directions on your fusible web.

Now, if you find that your edges fray a twinge or if the little points of the petals don't want to stay down, you can use a teeny, tiny dab of fabric glue (just a little bit on a toothpick) to hold it in place.  It shouldn't happen if you use a good quality cotton fabric but occasionally it will and there's no need to fret over it.  A little dab of glue will take care of it.

So that's it for Part 1 of the Broiderie Perse Applique Tutorial for Crazy Quilting.  I'm sure if you've done traditional sane quilting with applique in the past, you may think this is a no brainer but I like to write my tutorials for stitchers who have never tried some of these techniques before.  I want everyone to feel comfortable in learning new things and trying these tutorials so I really try to make them as clear as possible.

Part 2 of this tutorial will be on how to go about highlighting your applique with stitching.  I'll have that tutorial ready in about a week.  In the meantime, get your blocks sewn up and your applique ready.  I'm really hoping that some of my readers will give this a try.  It's a lot of fun and a great embellishment to add your crazy quilting skills!

Must See CQ Embellishments

I'm still bouncing off the walls here.  I've got a notebook started with my plans for my first issue of Crazy Quilt Gatherings magazine.  I have loads of great ideas already!  And I certainly welcome any and all suggestions so please send them my way!

I've been stitching on a cat doll but didn't get too far on it yet so I'll wait on photos of that.

For now, I'm going to send you over to Kathy Shaw's blog.  She's offering an online Crazy Quilt Class for beginners which would be perfect for anyone who as never done CQ.

Also, Kathy has posted the cutest little Cabochon Turtle embellishments!

There is a link for where you can purchase these!!  I may have to get one or two.  I love them!!!!

Students Please Check In

First, I would like to ask my students to check in with me.  Could you please leave a comment here on my blog or drop me an email.  I need to know how many students I currently have taking my Color & Composition Class.  Thanks!

I've been working on a few cellphone neck pouches so I thought for today, I would share the first one.  Here's the stitched pouch:

Lot's of bling here! 

And here are some closeup photos of the stitches, bead work and embellishments:

Something I like to do with prints is to highlight the design with stitches.  In this last photo, you can see that I outlined the large red flower with a Kreinik metallic #4 braid.  This gives it some dimension.

Edwardian Lady Purse

Now that my Crazy Quilt  Christmas Purse is finished, it's time to start a new project.  Well, as soon as I finish stitching up the example for Lesson 9 of my Crazy Quilt Online Course.

This is the block I'll be working on next:

I haven't done anything in black for awhile so I thought this would be a nice change from my brighter pieces.

Here are the embellishments that I pulled for this purse:

There's some interesting things in this photo, don't you think?  I'm very fortunate to have a decorating store nearby who gives me their outdated fabric and trim books.  Some of these pieces are things that they gave me.  Beautiful things!  And who doesn't love beautiful things?  All perfect for crazy quilting!

Sharon B's Stencils

I wanted to share with you a new tool for Crazy Quilting.  In case you've never been to Sharon B's blog, Pintangle, Sharon is a master crazy quilter who lives in Australia.  She's been stitching and teaching for many, many years and has recently released a wonderful set of stencils for marking crazy quilts:

I'm not going to post a ton of Sharon's photos here.  Just this one.  I'll let you hop over and check out Sharon B's Stencils for yourself. 

I just received mine on Friday and have already used them to create several borders:

I'm currently working on small projects so I haven't been able to experiment too much yet.  But I will be!  These stencils are awesome! 

In other news, here are a couple of new photos of my baby kitties:

I tried to get a new photo of Cotton but he still has that eye infection and I think the flash hurts his eyes.  Cotton and Wrigley are best friends, as you can see in this photo!

Welcome Wrigley

Scott and I adopted a little 3 month old kitten today.  This is Wrigley (after Wrigley Field in Chicago):

He's rather frightened but he's so sweet and gentle!  We'll be introducing Nightmare and Lucy to him shortly.  Right now, he's resting on the sofa with Scott.  They're be more photos soon.  I didn't want to overwhelm him with too many flashes at the moment.

In other news, Elegant Cross Stitch Sentiments For Crazy Quilting is now available!  Yeah!!!!

I'll have more photos of my new baby in the next day or so.  I just want him to relax and settle down a little bit.

Crazy Quilt Online Course

I finished up my crazy quilt block with the yellow rose which came from a vintage hankie.  As I mentioned the other day, I couldn't help myself, I had to add some pink!

This will be a pillow.  A gift for a friend.  I'll get it sewn up in a few days and post another photo of the finished piece.

In the meantime, for those of you who are taking my Online Crazy Quilt Course, I thought I'd show you how I make the eye move around my blocks using color.  Look closely at the pinks on the block.  Notice how the pinks flow.  Start near the bunny at the bottom and follow the pink buttons up to the large butterfly and Silk Ribbon roses at the top.  Coming down from the roses are 3 light pink butterflies.  Where does you eye end up?  At the pink flowers in the center under the yellow rose in the hankie.

That's how I use color to create my compositions.

And speaking of my Crazy Quilt Color and Composition Classes, this is Maria's block from Lesson 3:

Again, notice how Maria balanced her block with the hot pink flowers in the center.  This block is very well balanced, interesting with lots of pretty embellishments and pretty stitching.  Well done Maria!