Sewing With Nancy

Most of us look forward to easy and artistic sewing projects. Throw in the fact that these projects are also adorable, and I know you'd like to add them to your sewing to-do list. Have I piqued your interest? Well, I'd like you to welcome Donna Fenske, a member of the Sewing With Nancy team, who will share her designs of hats and scarves that are designed just for kids. Welcome back, Donna. Thank you, Nancy. And I really enjoy sewing for my grandchildren, and I really like the end results that pique their interest. Start with high loft fleece. Cut out simple pattern shapes. Add easy to sew applique. Stitch together with streamline sewing skills. And, the result is a cold weather duo that takes on the personality of animal friends.

Cuddle Buddies

Hats and Scarves, that's what's next on Sewing With Nancy. Sewing with Nancy, TV's longest-airing sewing and quilting program with Nancy Zieman

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making a difference in sewing, quilting, crafting, and needle arts for over 90 years. Fuller Brush vacuums, dedicated to keeping homes clean. Amazing Designs and Klass Needles. One of the best parts of my job is that I get to work with very creative people, and Donna designed these adorable hats. And we're going to start with, or look at the basic shape. Now, it's a very basic shape. It just has a crown with a band, and there's four crown sections, and it enables us to add really cute features to create a cat, a zebra. Basically it's all the same pattern pieces with some variations of the ears. And a little mane there, and then we also have to have a tiger and add some stripes to the features. And then we have a giraffe also featured here. And those are soft horns. I had to do a little research to find out exactly what those were, and they are a soft horn. Well, the sewing is all very basic, believe it or not. It's the shapes that make it happen. And, Donna, you've used high loft fleece. Yes. And the pattern is designed so that we use the greatest amount of stretch that goes around the head. When you stretch it, it rolls to one side. So this happens to roll to the wrong side. They look about the same. Just choose one side as the proverbial right or the wrong. What we do, because of the stretch, either we use a straight seam, a traditional straight stitch, or we use also a wobble stitch that has a little built-in stretch. And here you can see that stitch that I'm sewing. It's about a 0.5 width and 2.0 to 2.5 length. It just gives a little extra give. Right. But yet it looks straight from the right side. So that's the one we kind of prefer. So you're going to cut out-- you don't need a lot of fabric. No, no. Basically, about just under a yard of fabric. And what we're going to do is we're going to cut out, depending on the little critter, you're going to have little ears and nose or whatever, so we cut out the ears. And you do it-- They have a lining. So we've cut that out of a separate-- two pieces for each ear. Two colors. And the majority of the hat is put together with 1/2" seam allowances. The little additions of the ears and horns use a 1/4" seam. But what we have, we cut out four crowns out of our fleece fabric, and then we also used four for the lining out of an interlock. The band consists of, again, two pieces. And then we also have ear flaps. We have two sets that have two pieces of fabric. We also cut out two straps that are like 14" x 1" long. And they're multiple sizes, so you can make them from infants to toddlers. They're about an 18.5" circumference, to a 22" circumference around the hat. Good point. Okay, so now we're ready to maybe do some sewing. And with fleece you're welcome to just make the ties by folding wrong sides together and stitching raw edges. It's not going to ravel at all. And then, we will attach it to the lower curve of the little ear flap, and then we're just going to do our wobble stitch. Then we will trim with a pinking sheers or a rotary cutter. And I like to use the rotary cutter, and we're going to just pink the edges. And that'll make it easy for turning the little ears and flaps to the right side. So I would continue doing that all the way around our little ear components. And you're going to somewhat assemble this before we start personalizing the caps by adding the appliqus. Donna has made two of these ear flaps, and they've been attached to the band. And then the crown, we sew four crowns together, but one crown in the center is sewn up 3" and the other is 1.5" on either end. And that allows us to have a really nice working area for our facial features. They're going to go right in this area, and you can choose from a kitty to a tiger to whatever. But you all have to get to this point. So, next, you'll see how to do the appliqus. Lions and tigers and zebras, oh my. Appliqus will make your sewing project take on character. Even if you've never attempted appliqus before, you'll have immediate sewing success after following Donna's sewing tips. Now, Donna, the tiger and the cat have very similar appliqus. They're actually the same except for adding the detail of the stripes for the tiger. So it's really fun that you can build interesting characters out of one design almost. Now, the way to make appliqus with fleece is to use a double-sided sticky stabilizer. And what this means is that there's a matte side that Donna is going to draw on. Between the layers is a double-sided sticky, and then a shiny side of a paper. This saves the day and also the sewing. When you see the sewing, you can kind of be off, and it still looks good. Plus, with fleece, you can't iron. So you need that sticky positioning to help position the appliqus. So now in the book, in the reference material that we have, we have our applique components, and I'm just going to trace the mouth of the cat or tiger, and then I'm also going to copy the inner nose detail. And then I would roughly cut them out. Leaving, oh, 1/8" or so. Right. And then you peel off one side of the sticky and apply it to the fabric. The wrong side of the fabric. Correct. And then you also do the same with the other components. Then cut around the shape. And that's what we have here and, ta-da, you peel of the other side of it. So now it's sticky on both sides. And, as Donna said, you can't press on here, so you just position. What do you think? I think it might have to go down just a little bit. All right. That looks good. Then we would also add the nose. Okay. There we are. And, also, I did trace the inner detail on wash-away. And that's found here. So we're going to do that at the sewing machine to see what really happens, but to do the stitching along this area. If you'd like to build the eyes, they have quite a few components. We have basically three layers to create the eyes, and we're going to just position them. And what's really nice is that you can audition the placement. Yeah, and you can release that sticky paper. Yes. And you might want to-- I don't know if I'm getting these right. But, again, you can always reposition. They're easy to reposition. And, again, because we stitched the center front crown-- I think he looks cross-eyed. So please help me out. (laughing) Because we stitched the crown up only 3", it gives us a really flat area to place our appliqus. And I think it'd kind of re-round this and cut that, but you can get the idea. Now, if you were making a tiger, then the little V shapes are here. And we can add those. We'll get them added better later. But this just shows you how quickly you can add an applique, and now it's time to do the stitching. High loft fleece is extremely forgiving, so it's the perfect first project if you're working with an applique. And Donna's going to be stitching the muzzle or the mouth area with a zigzag stitch, and then she used just a straight stitch to stitch the three layers of the eyes. And you have to do a lot of turning, Donna, when you're doing this. Just use a new needle, clear thread, so you don't have to change thread colors every time, and an open toe foot makes it much easier to see where you're going next. We're not pressing much here, Donna. No, I'm working with fleece, so I'm not pressing the seams open. I am pinning them open. Underneath here I have several seams, so I'll pin them open so I get a really nice, flat area. And because I'm also working with kind of a heavier fleece, I really don't need stabilizer underneath either. And I'm using a zigzag stitch that is like 2.5 wide, and the length is like a 1.4. So it's not a really heavy coverage. You just stitch and stitch and stitch. It just continues to stitch, and we'll go all the way around to complete the portion of the mouth. Then, after you've stitched down all the first layer of the appliqus, you obviously need to do the eyes, and if you're making the tiger, you'd need to add the stripes. But then that inner detail. Donna's going to change threads and this time change it to a rayon embroidery thread. And you saw how she traced the tails on wash-away stabilizer. That's going to placed on the top or over the muzzle area. And then a zigzag stitch in various widths. And, Donna, you found-- you're changing threads-- that you sometimes had to stitch twice to get coverage. I kind of like doing that, going over it twice. It just give me a nice coverage. And so the first time I'm just going to do one whisker, and I'm going to stitch, get it in position nice, and lower and start sewing. Now, the beauty-- if you've never used wash-away stabilizer-- is that when she finishes all the whiskers, then you can tear it away. Right. If you don't get good coverage, then you can do it again. And the wash-away actually keeps the thread on top of the fabric. And, actually, it did a really nice stitch here so I'm not going to go over it again. Now, for the mouth, you'd probably change. If you'd like to sew that, you could change it to a wider width. Right, right. Also, if you wanted to, also for the mouth, if you didn't want black, you could also change your thread color. Mm-hmm, sure. And we'll start going again. If you wanted to, you could pin down the wash-away, but it certainly isn't necessary because you're managing fine. Yes. And these inner details give such great character. They do. To the little cuddly buddies. And, again, we have just completed half of the mouth. Well, you can see it isn't difficult sewing. You're working on a flat surface, or a flat fabric I should say, not surface, and these, of course, have been sewn. You can definitely see that here the whiskers in the mouth have been stitched. For the little tiger, Donna added the stripes, even stripes to the ears before they were sewn together. You'll be adding the appliqus as flat as possible, with our cute little giraffe. The spots were added, again, in this flat area. So you'll spend a time at your sewing machine adding the details, and now it's time to add the rest of the character. With subtle applique variations, Cuddle Buddy hats take on different personas. A shape of the ears, position of the mane, or tweaking the shape of the eyes allows you to create a hat to your child's liking. Donna did a little bit additional stitching to finish the whiskers on the cat. I did the inner detail, and then we simply start to remove the wash-away. And if there's a little bit leftover... Just dab it with a little water. Q-tip would remove it. A little water on a Q-tip. And then we have different shapes of ears that are just simply sewn. And then we pink the edges so that when you turn them right side out, it gives you a really nice edge. And for the cat, we're simply going to position the ears like 3/4" from the crowned edge. You'll see different pointed ears. You'll see tentacles. You'll see soft horns, but, also, we have a shark. We have a shark. So you need the little fins and the tails that you need to make. Also, we're going to detail the cute teeth that are on the shark here. And to create those, again, we would trace the pattern in the book on the pressure-sensitive applique paper. Remove the sticky backing, and apply the cut out shape on another layer of fleece. Trim it and we're going to just zigzag those edges together because it gives us a nice beefy little edge for the teeth. And then we apply them to the lower band of the hat. So you can kind of see the progression. It's fun building, putting these layers together. Now, we have various manes, and we left that crown section open by a little bit so that the manes could be inserted for the zebra and for the giraffe. And, Donna, you have to cut the mane. Right, right. So what I have here-- and I like using two cutting boards. I have my mane taped down. I'm going to overlay the second cutting board 1/2" in. And then I'm going to take my rotary cutter and ruler, and I'm going to just move the rotary cutter over every 1/2", 1/4" whatever you would like to create the mane. And it's really quick and easy. So that's a great way of getting things evened out, and so for a few of the animals you'll start the mane at the forehead area, as the giraffe and zebra. And for the lion, Donna has stitched up the crowns and then added the lion mane across the top so that you get the personality of the lion or the giraffe or zebra. And various ears and horns and...

Both

Clover

: Antennas. You can really make great shapes. So, you can kind of see the basic premise. And they're all created by adding personalized touches. Hats with matching scarves complete the cold weather combo. Like the hats, the scarves are created with fleece-friendly sewing techniques. You only need to spend a little over two hours of time to stitch up faux paws, wings, or perhaps hooves. These component really make an adorable ensemble, Donna, and for dress up as well. Right. And, basically, each scarf pattern has two components. One to put your hand in, which is the mitt part. And then, because we had a kitty here, we made stockings. So he also has paw prints on the underside. So we actually have three layers of fabric here. And this is just hemmed, and then we just zigzag the edges together. With wrong sides together. So these are basically the quick components that you use to create this scarf, the cat, and I have the paw print on the under edge. And I would zigzag this edge, stack all three layers together after it's been hemmed, and I would zigzag that outer edge. And all of the animal shapes or the fish shapes or the bugs. We have some little bugs. They're all made in the same way. And I like the finishing of just raw edges. Really, you could do the ears this way, if you really wanted to. I figured the ears were easy to turn. They were a small project. This is not difficult sewing at all. So when we get to this, this is one of my favorites. We saved the best for the last. We didn't show the appliqus, but you can see... It has a lot of character Oh, it does. It does. Woo-woo. And the scarf is a little bit more detailed. The pattern is shaped. Because we had the wing, and I wanted to show the wing. The feathers on both sides of the scarf itself. So, again, I had reversible matching components for the wingtips. Because we're using fleece, and fleece is so forgiving, when these were designed, this is the basic pattern for the mitten side, and then you simply cut out the appliqus and apply them with that sticky, double sticky tape or stabilizer. I guess we got to scoot those two together. But then you just zigzag. Quickly zigzag, and when you have both top and bottom zigzagged together, you stack them and pin them nicely, and then you're going to zigzag the outer edges together to complete those wingtips. So you don't have any difficult turning because they're just met wrong sides together, and the zigzag occurs. Donna, these are amazing designs. You're very clever. Thank you. I have the great job of working with creative people, and I appreciate you sharing these with our viewers. I had fun. Thank you. Our Nancy's Corner segment once again goes on location to the Quilt Expo in Madison, Wisconsin, to give you a preview into how fabric is designed. With me today is Jane Sassaman, award-winning quilter and fabric designer with bold, beautiful color. Welcome, Jane, to our segment of Sewing With Nancy. Thank you, Nancy. Now, you are known for, as I mentioned, color, design. It's got a lot of impact. Tell our viewers what you told me about what someone classified your workmanship as. Well, actually, it was my brother-in-law. And he said, "Jane's work is William Morris on antidepressants."

LAUGHTER

Clover

Well, it's beautiful work. Well, I think it was a compliment. I think it was too, and I think what we'd like to share with our viewers is how you go about, the process of designing fabrics. And you brought along some illustrations that show where you begin. Well, I'm a nature girl, so everything starts there. And very often it's something I have growing in my own yard. And I love Millefleur prints. And so, for this particular design, I just started drawing characters of favorite flowers. And then I actually cut them all apart and arranged them into a repeatable design. So what you see from the black and white now is in your repeatable design. Right. And here. And then I can scan it into the computer and start working with color. And with a line of fabric, for me anyway, it's usually three different color ways that sometimes talk to each other because they have some of the same colors in each color way. And then when you send the fabric art to the manufacturer, you choose the colors and where it goes. And we have to have big blocks of color, at least 2", so they scan and match the color. And it really is amazing when you get your strike-offs back that they are so good at picking these odd kind of greens, for example, but they can really match them up. A beautiful arrangement of 12 colors here that make this fabric just pop. Mm-hmm. What is your most challenging part, Jane, of designing fabrics? Well, I think these days it's that I have to do two lines a year. Ah. So that just means I'm designing all the time, and so scheduling can be difficult because one line just came out, so I have to show people what's made with that. I'm designing another line at the same time and getting strike-offs from another line all together. So keeping that straight is not necessarily an easy thing to do. Now, strike-offs, to our viewers, means the preliminary fabric. The first round that really isn't for sale. It's maybe on fabric that's not quite as up to par. Right, and it's usually hand screened. So that's where you check your lines and your colors and your bleed and all of that and give it the thumbs up or the thumbs down. Now, a quilt that you have made with this fabric that you designed, our viewers can see now. It's a lovely combination. You really do-- a lot of times I noticed in your work-- you have blocks on point and some simple styling, but, wow, what impact it has. The fabric does the work. The piecing is very, very simple, and that's one thing I've learned. The bigger the print, the bigger the pieces you cut out. You just let the fabric do the work for you. It would be a shame to cut this into little pieces. Well, I totally agree, and that's why I promote making shower curtains and duvet covers and pillowcases and all of that. Things beyond quilting. I think it has a bigger life than that. Well, keep up the work. I know it maybe seems like a treadmill, but as a consumer, I appreciate your work and admire you. Well, thankfully I actually enjoy every minute of it, so thank you very much. And it shows. Thank you, Jane. Thank you. Remember that you can rewatch this episode of Sewing with Nancy and many seasons worth of programming at NancyZieman.com. While you're at the site, click to read my blogs or join me on various social media platforms. Thanks for joining me. Bye for now. Donna Fenske has written the book "

Cuddle Buddies

Hat and Scarves " which is used as the reference for this one-part program. The book includes full-size applique patterns It's $12.99, plus shipping and handling. To order the book call 1-800-336-8373 or visit our website at sewingwithnancy.com/2926.

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Cuddle Buddies

Ha ts and Scarves. Credit card orders only. To pay by check or money order call the number on the screen for details. Visit Nancy's website at NancyZieman.com to see additional episodes, Nancy's blog, and more. Sewing with Nancy TV's longest-airing sewing and quilting program with Nancy Zieman

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