Chocolate wrappers free machine stitches with the help of Solufix and Solufleece. Oh how I suffer for my art!!! I love the bright, shiny colours of chocolate wrappers and enjoy using them as flashes of colour in my work. When ironed lightly between baking parchment they texture like Tyvek but remain soft enough to stitch into. They do ping about a bit if you try to free machine them but with the new Solufix I have no more trouble with them. Solufix is a self adhesive water soluble fabric on a strong backing paper that is removed to reveal the sticky side of the Solufix. Because the backing paper is so firm it means you can run it through an ink jet printer, print your design, remove the backing paper and then lay threads around your design and free machine to your hearts content. You may need to cover your threads with a layer of Solufleece if any of the glue is exposed. The glue will not affect your machine needle.    I stuck all my chocolate wrapper strips to the...

 The 'crashed' newspaper, Bondaweb and Solufleece What! not MORE newspaper - Yep!!! I'm afraid so . . . . I have had a chance to catch up with some work and try some samples I have been wanting to play with. Today's task was to try 'crashing' newspaper with Solufleece. I do it all time with fabrics. (For step by step photos and full instructions go to the Solufleece page on www.nid-noi.com) To crash fabric or newspaper you need to layer from the bottom up -  1 layer of Solufleece,  2 layers of Bondaweb off the baking paper your top fabric/newspaper Layer everything up and stitch 'tram lines' about the width of the foot of your sewing machine apart through all 4 layers. You can experiment with different widths and maybe trying wavy lines once you have done your first sample. Being VERY careful not to burn yourself in your excitement - Steam your sample until it shrinks up or 'crashes'. This can be done wi...

One full body massage and a long sleep later . . . Oh I am getting too old to do these shows for much longer! One of the wonderful things about Fashion, Embroidery & Stitch is that further education and higher education colleges are invited to have stands to show off the students fascinating work across the field of textiles. In these days of swingeing cuts and uncertainty in education it was good to see such positive energy, technical skill and fantastic ideas. The colleges also have the opportunity to show work in the amazing fashion shows put on by the indefatigable Brenda Killigrew of Inkberrow Design Centre. www.inkberrowdesigncentre.co.uk There were so many remarkable outfits to show this year that Brenda had to put on 2 different fashion shows which were rotated throughout the day. This was an amazing feat as Brenda and all the models and helpers had only hours to prepare.   the garments from Longslade on the cat walk As some of you may know I occasionally work wit...

 The Textile Studio at Denman I love teaching at Denman College - the home of the W.I.   The teaching studios are well equipped, the food is great and I always have fab students in my group. The workshop ran from the 25th - 27th and a good time was had by all. The word had got round that I like to do stretching exercises to music with my students after lunch every day to help every one stay awake and feel refreshed. I was going to leave this as after all; I was teaching at the W.I. but no, my ladies were expecting it to be part of the course. Oh we did have a laugh! The students were - Jane Bothwell, Helen Dickinson, Sheilah Edgson, Jean Harnaman, Carole Jethwa, Jeanette Lamb, Patricia Richards, Margaret Sargeant, Pauline Walker and Jill Wilson.  The workshop was fast paced to cover all the products everyone wanted to try. The students painted and dyed Tyvek, Bondaweb, Vilene Spunbond and various weights of sew-in and iron-on interfacings. These were then layered up ...