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Machine embroidery could possibly be your passion or maybe it's something you'd like to try. If you're a newbie or wanna-be embroiderer my guest today, Eileen Roche, is back again. The two of us will show you how to learn machine embroidery in six easy lessons. Eileen, nice to have you back. You're our resident embroidery expert. Nice to be here, Nancy. Eleven years ago, we taught machine embroidery. Today, I have learned that the process comes down to six key learning points. We're going to begin with embroidery basics and what to look for in a machine and supplies in order to begin your embroidery journey. "Machine Embroidery in Six Easy Lessons" that's what's coming up next on Sewing with Nancy. Sewing with Nancy, celebrating 30 years of sewing and quilting with Nancy Zieman

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Baby Lock, a complete line of sewing, quilting and embroidery machines and sergers. Baby Lock, for the love of sewing. Madeira, specializing in embroidery, quilting and special-effect threads because creativity is never black and white. Koala Studios, fine sewing furniture custom-built in America. Clover, makers of sewing, knitting quilting and embroidery products for over 25 years. Experience the Clover difference. Amazing Designs and Klass needles. Lesson One is getting to know embroidery machines and the basics that you need to have. If you're a newbie or a wanna be Eileen, you start with the machine. There are certain features that will make your embroidery more universal and you'll be able to do more things. Definitely it's wise to look for a machine that features a 5" x 7" sewing field. It will come with a hoop that has that same size. Then, key editing features that are quite helpful right at the machine are "rotate", where we can spin by one degree, ten or 90 degrees. You can see as I spin it it's actually rotating right on the screen. Then we'll hit close. Maybe we'd like to mirror image it. When I do that, you can see it's flopped. I stitched out one design and mirror imaged it so you can see just how important this would be. It's great when creating a monogram brackets, and so forth. Sure, on a lapel if you want to embroider one side or the other. You can do the mirror imaging. There's two features that are key to success. One is the trace feature. That enables you to position your needle in nine different points of the design. You can also travel around the entire perimeter of the design but it's these stop points that are so helpful when connecting designs. You may wonder how we're going to use those features well, that's why we have six lessons. We'll show you how they work. One of the other last features to look for is the base feature. That's a key that adds a running stitch outline before the embroidery design. I call it like driving with auto insurance. You can drive without it, but you're better off with it. So you'll see how that works. If you're buying a machine, those are the features that mid-range machines have available. You don't have to buy the top of the line. They're very common on many machines. You have your machine, some features and then some supplies that you need. You want to put your designs on a blank. Rather than having to sew it initially most embroiderers like to start with towels, napkins, shirts. We call them blanks. They come in all sizes and shapes. You know, investigate sources in your area. Start on fabrics or blanks that you don't absolutely love so that you can test first. You might have an old towel that you can test out your monogramming or embroidery, and then go on to the new towel. But in order to embroider, you'll need stabilizer. Stabilizers are the hidden support on any fabric. I have a whole basket here of stabilizers. They're not very pretty in color. No, they aren't but they're imperative to a successful embroidery design. Because you have all those stitches and you need to give the fabric some support. This is a cutaway, I think, that speaks for itself. It's a mesh that stays behind the embroidery after it's completed. On lighter weight fabrics, you may consider a tearaway. The name speaks for itself. When you're finished embroidering, they rip away. The third category are the washaway stabilizers. When they first came out, they were all clear, like this. They're great for nap fabrics. They are. They're wonderful for translucent fabrics because they disappear. Then there are washaways that are opaque. Again, they've got a cornstarch base so it just dissolves in water. The fourth category, and you'll see us use these. You don't need all these at once. The adhesives that have a paper backing and then a sticky part where the fabric will stick to it within the hoop. Eileen, you had pretty designs. They come in different formats, also. Many are built into the machine. They're available to download from the Internet. You can purchase collections on memory cards, on CDs. But if you do this you have to transfer the design from the CD to a USB stick which then goes inside of the machine so you can retrieve your design. When you buy your machine, you'll get some lessons. There are hundreds of thousands of designs. Use pretty thread. Rayon thread is what we're going to be using today. Polyester thread is great, embroidery thread. It's going to be laundered frequently. You'll need a bobbin thread, a lightweight thread. Wind lots of bobbins. You'll need black or white. Make sure that when you're embroidering the same old adage as if you're sewing or quilting, or embroidering you need to put in a new needle. Get a needle that's appropriate for the fabric. A stretch needle for knits and a sharp for wovens. So, Lesson One is getting to know the basics what you need for tools, and that's our lesson. The star of your embroidery is obviously the design. Knowing the types and categories of designs and there are many can help you make wise embroidery choices. Lesson Two of our machine embroidery class is simply, types of designs. Although we're sitting at our machines we're really not going to stitch or embroider until Lesson Five. But it's important that you see the design and how it breaks down. Eileen, you're going to show that to us on the simple daffodil design. The beauty of an embroidery machine is that it stops and lets you change colors. It's color separated for you already. Our first color in this daffodil design is the leaves. That's the background. Then we advance this to color two which is the background or fill stitches of the daffodil itself. You see that in the upper right corner, the change. Then as I advance to color three now I have some highlights and also some running stitch outlines that will add final accents. Then the dark shading is what really lets those pretty stitches pop. So that's how you look at it when it's stitched as single colors. But let's look at the progress as you actually stitch along. Color one. Now we have color one and two. Then color one through three. Finally the whole beautiful design showcases all four colors. It truly looks like a daffodil now. Understanding how the design is built is fascinating to me. That's why we like to show that to you. We mentioned that towels and napkins are great places to start your embroidery projects. That begins with the design options. There are different types of embroidery designs. Lettering, most certainly, is extremely popular. You see this with name tags, and monogramming text messages, quilt labels, you name it. Look at all the different options. But not all lettering or designs are for all fabrics. We have stitched out a stacked design in three different fabrics. First, I can show you that on cotton quilting fabric that's been interfaced with a cutaway. It looks beautiful. The fill stitches are perfect. Those decorative elements in the center pop right off that fabric. But then, when we go to a very lightweight knit fabric you'll notice that around the fill stitches we have some puckering and some bulging of the fabric. I don't like this. I don't think it's an appropriate treatment for this fabric. Finally, when we look at this design on terry cloth this is eye opening to me. We have stitched part of it with the water soluble film type stabilizer on top and part of the design has no stabilizer. You can see, with the stabilizer the stitches are lifted off the nap. They actually pop. It looks beautiful. Up here without the stabilizer we have the loops of the terry cloth working through the fill. But believe it or not, after this towel is laundered the entire design is going to look like that. This is not a good selection for terry cloth fabric. Since most beginner embroiderers gravitate to towels-- That's how I learned to embroider. I made gifts of towels with initials on them and monograms. The design that you choose has to have a certain thing you call a double underlay. Underlay is a topic you're going to think, "What is that?" It's not pretty. No. But it's very functional. This is the start of a letter "G" that you'll see in a few minutes. It has one single underlay. That is the wide zigzag stitches. That's common to most embroidery designs. That's what they start out with. Giving it a base, a foundation. But for terry and nap fabrics, you need a double underlay. You don't necessarily know that. Until you stitch it out. That's why I really encourage everyone to make a test sample of the design before they stitch it on their good project. What was stitched on this peach colored fabric is what you see on this guest towel. We're going to use this sample later on in the series so we don't have the stabilizer removed. But that "G" has a double underlay underneath so that the stitches will stay pretty and on top of the fabric. Even if you're laundering it, which that's important because that's what you do to towels, you wash them. Yeah, exactly. So getting to know your design is all part of this lesson. That's the elements of a design then we have different types of designs. A quilting design and outline running stitch which you may like to do by hand. I wish I could do it by hand, but I can't. What a beautiful way of quilting layers of fabric together. This is a fast embroidery. You'll see as you test things out that you can embroider lace. Lace is done on a removable stabilizer so that it completely disappears. Here we have it stitched on this mesh type of water soluble. Now you see the stabilizer has been washed away and you have the translucent, see-through lace. I just put it in a coffee cup of water and presto, it's gone. Then we have appliqu, these two types. This type is raw edge appliqu and the trimming occurs after it comes out of the hoop. So that's your finished hero, which is quite beautiful. Traditional appliqu consists of three steps. That is a running stitch outline that's called the placement guide. That shows you how large you have to have your appliqu fabric to cover it. Once you know that, place the fabric on top and stitch the next color, which is the tackdown. Then trim that tackdown away, reattach the hoop to the machine and do the final satin stitching which is the pretty outline. We realize we're not embroidering yet but it's important to understand all the options that you have. A great place to start is monogramming. We're going to show you how to work on towels as well as napkins. But now you know the types of designs how they're sequenced together. Now we'll show you how to get the fabric in the hoop in preparation for the stitching. Machine embroidery is easy. It's the placement that can be tricky. For that reason, Eileen has chosen embroidery placement as the third lesson in this series. Without perfect placement even the most beautiful embroidery doesn't make the grade. Placement and hooping and then stitching, all go hand in hand so to get the design that you can easily stitch out in the right spot we have the first option, which is a stitched template. You just hoop a translucent fabric. In this case, I used a stabilizer. I stitched the design dead center in the hoop without changing any position on the design. We're going to wreck the design. Yeah, we are! I've already traced the interior of the design. I'm going to draw right over that. It's kind of painful for me to do that being an embroiderer. Then connect the horizontal lines. Now I know the center of my design, the actual size, which is imperative when I am placing it on a garment. We show you this first, because this is the way all of us who learned machine embroidery from the get-go this is how we had to do it. Right, let me trim this down. But keep that perimeter of the hoop so you know exactly the size. Then, when it's time to place it on the garment your best friend is the mirror. On a t-shirt such as this, you'd put it on your body and then you would pin this or tape it. To the shirt itself. You're going to use that when you hoop. You want to center the template within the hoop. You'll position your needle. We'll do this later, but that's the whole reason why we're showing the templates. If we had trimmed this, this would be a lot easier. It would. Before we hoop it, we'll trim this to the exact size then tape it down. You'll see in our next lesson how we use that in the hoop. So, a stitched template. Preparation. It's all about preparation. Now, many of you will be able to print out your embroideries. Any embroidery software program that you have will allow you to print the screen in its actual size. It most likely will have some notches you know, some printed images on the horizontal and vertical centers. Take a Sharpie or a marker and draw the lines to connect that. If you have stock designs that are in your machine I usually do the stitched embroidery like number one. But here's an apron, we can position it there. The paper templates are easy to work with. They tape and pin very easily. They last a long time so if you do go to the trouble of printing them out keep them in a folder. Maybe write the stitch name on it, the design name so you know exactly what design it is. You're not going to sew through this it's for positioning and placement. Those are kind of the basics. Then, there are tools that can help you as well. One of the most common things other than towels and napkins to embroider are shirts. Polo shirts, golf shirts. Left chest embroidery is the most common place to land an embroidery design. You'll see that in casual wear, sporting goods, uniforms, that type of thing. You'll certainly want that to be in a pleasing position. It needs to look great on figures. So it needs to be a little high off the chest. You can measure. There's a two finger rule where you place your two fingers at the neckline and then down about seven or eight inches is common. But there's some really helpful tools that help you do it quickly. I would fold it in half, center front. Then there's a little notch. You center that right over the buttonhole. Make sure that your straight edge is aligned with the fold. There we go. There's two openings, and they have different sizes. This polo shirt is a small, so we'll put a target sticker. I'll talk about them in a moment. Put it right in that notch and another one down at the bottom. That's giving me the alignment guide. We have a lot of applications on the embroidery but you can just use an office supply sticker. Put a little mark on it. You just put a cross hair on it, Nancy and put an arrowhead on one leg of the cross hair. That always designates the top of the embroidery design. Without it, you don't know which way is up. You can get the pre-printed ones that already have the stickers. I'm going to lean over. I may not get it lined up exactly here but I think it'll work. Your machine may come with stickers. These are positioning markers that the machine actually reads and will rotate the design for you if you have a rotated hoop square. But when you're hooping you're going to focus on this one. Also keep an eye on the lower target sticker to make sure you're square in the hoop. So, options for getting things straight. Then, napkins and towels. We said earlier that the number one reason why people embroider is to do napkins and towels. It looks so simple, until you want a whole set to match. There are two ways to do this. You can kind of use an angle to find the center. I have a target ruler that has four legs. I would position, maybe the 2-1/2 mark on the top stitch hemline. I want to make sure that the arms are hitting that line that topstitch line at the same increment on each side. Place a target sticker in there. Again, arrowhead toward the body of the napkin. Now I know exactly where to land my embroidery design. We've gone from the very simple of stitching and making your own to here we have numerous napkins made with the same design. There are templates made, just like they use in industry. That's right. That's exactly how they were developed. This beautiful, generous 1-1/2" hem would allow me to place an embroidery design closer into the body of the napkin. I just align that square on the hem stitch line and drop a target sticker in the opening. I could do that whole set in about ten minutes and get them aligned. Now that you know how to mark napkins towels are very comparable. There are templates that they use in industry that we have as stitchers and embroiderers. You've already marked the vertical center with a pin. I'm going to place a template with the horizontal line right at the top of the border. When you put a target sticker in there with the arrowhead pointing into the body your monogram will stitch out as planned. Exactly in the right spot. We've done three lessons on machine embroidery. The basics, working with designs, and then placement. Next comes hooping. Placement and hooping go hand in hand. Do any of you have the task of reorganizing your sewing space on your to-do list? Today's Nancy's Corner guest is a professional organizer helping creative people like you and me spring clean all year round. Please welcome Gretchen Hudock a previous pattern designer, quilt designer but now a spring cleaner. Well, we use the term "spring cleaning" a little differently when we're organizing our spaces. Gretchen has a great acronym for spring cleaning which will help us in organizing. Right, you need to know the steps that you need to go through in order to spring clean. We start with "S" and that means sort through all of your items. We'll show examples of how to do that. Then because you sort through, you're going to "P". Pare down. You have to give up some things, most of the time. You might have enough room to keep everything but you still need to go through it. There may be some things you can get rid of. Then for "R". That's where you're going to re-use, re-purpose, recycle. Try to re-use them somewhere else not just throw everything in the dumpster. And "I". "I" is identify locations where you're going to put the items. In containers, and all things like that. Next, for "N". That's where you find the containers so they fit the locations to store your items. Then the "G" is kind of important. "G" is very important. Gotta put things away. So the acronym SPRING, you're going to spring clean. We have some pictures of a client that you worked with. This is a great "before." Yes, it's a classic "before" picture. Things are scattered all over the place. She had a lot of different hobbies and they were all incorporated into once space. She had her knitting, embroidery, sewing and her quilting all in one area. First of all, we had to do all the spring cleaning areas. But to begin with, when you're sorting it's good to have boxes sitting out so that you can decide where you're going to put the different items once you sort through them. When you're sorting your stuff into boxes you ask yourself some questions. Correct, you have to ask yourself, do I use it. Or when have I last used it? That's a good point. Do I need it? Do I want it? If you don't use it, and you don't need it then you can share it with somebody else. That's why the boxes are marked. You can repair it. You can donate it, or keep it. Right, you can come up with your own categories. You may have a charity that you want to donate things to. There's a lot of different charities that do accept fabric donations. You had fun buying it. Don't feel that, oh, I can't get rid of it because I bought it once. It was fun when you bought it. You enjoyed the fabric, but maybe you've gone beyond that or maybe you have a different focus. I think sometimes buying fabric is inexpensive therapy. It is. It's a lot cheaper than spending an hour in someone's office. Right, that is very true. And styles change, tastes change. You change. Or new products come out that make things easier to do for sewing so you may need those type of things. The most impressive part is seeing the after. This is the same room. You didn't put the "after" stuff in a closet or garage. No, we didn't. When you see "befores" and "afters" it's always so much fun to look at. That can be my space, and everything has a space. That makes it easier when you're going to put things away which you have to do you know where it's going to go. Most of the time, we don't have a place for it. That's why our rooms are like the "before" picture. You were able to reuse a lot of the organizers. You just got rid of stuff. Right, the client actually went through and did a lot of homework in between our sessions and went through everything and got rid of a lot of things, not everything. But then we had cabinetry that was full of something else that we re-purposed and put other items in there that just made more sense for her usage. Gretchen, you've given us a lot of ideas for spring cleaning using that acronym sort out, and put away, and recycle and reuse. I think I'm going to apply that to my sewing room at home. Thank you for being our guest. You're welcome. Thank you for joining us on Sewing with Nancy. If you'd like more information on how Gretchen sorts, organizes and does spring cleaning you can go to nancyzieman.com where you'll find all things Sewing with Nancy. Click on Nancy's Corner, and you'll go right to her link. If you'd like to re-watch this program or you want to pick up a few tips from older programs or upcoming programs again, at nancyzieman.com, you can watch 52 of the most current Sewing with Nancy programs right online, in the convenience of your home. You can also sign up for Facebook and Twitter and be social with my blog, as well. Next time, we'll be back again with Eileen Roche for our second program on "Machine Embroidery in Six Easy Lessons" right here on Sewing with Nancy. Thanks for joining me. Bye for now. Eileen Roche's book, "Machine Embroidery in Six Easy Lessons" includes all the information from this two-part series and four essential embroidery tools. The full-color book with tools is $29.99, plus shipping and handling. 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