Canada Embroidery Cushion

I am being super organised and writing this post at the weekend even though you are now reading it midweek. Why you ask? Well This Tuesday and Thursday evening (yes evening, of all the times?!) I have exams. Third year university psychology exams. So that explains my quietness during the last week or so...revision is taking my time and when not revising I have been chilling or spending time with my family.

The good news is my exams will be over on Thursday night. The bad news is I then have a 4000 word assignment due in a week and a half....but then again, I have already written it, it just needs some editing.
 So the upshot is I am having Friday off. And I am going to sew and craft and relax as much as possible!

A while ago I shared with you several tutorials for designing and sewing your own embroidery cushions. For my Mum's Christmas present this year, I decided to use them myself! I chose Canada as it is a very special place for our family - we love visiting and I am so jealous happy for my Mum that her and my Dad are returning there for a week in February.

I know that there are some Canadians who follow this blog so might read this post, see the cushion and be fairly confused about the things I decided to embroider. That is the beauty of the cushion...it is so completely personal. So although Parliament Hill makes sense, the 'Les Suites' logo refers to the hotel we always stay in, and the bear refers to one that my mum and I met in Edmonton Mall! We usually visit Ottawa but in the summer of 2003, we spent 5 weeks travelling across Canada stopping in Quebec, Edmonton, Jasper, Vancouver - it was an amazing holiday and I have so many great memories of that trip.

I was 11 and my brother 14, and on the trip I ate a snail (or swallowed it with my eyes closed! - in a restaurant by the way...not just a random snail!), stayed in the hotel alone with my brother one evening while my parents went to watch some fireworks (we watched Legally Blonde and felt like such rebels when we went down the corridor to get ice!), and decided I was desperate to go canoeing only to get out into the middle of the lake and decide that I was absolutely petrified of the water and we had to go back! It was the first time I ever saw 'Friends' on TV, saw a whale or two in the ocean (or at least their tails) and had a girls night with my Mum (the boys went to see a Canadian Football game - we ate pizza and saw Freaky Friday)

As you can tell I have so many memories of that trip and our other visits to Canada and this is where the design for this cushion came from!

Do you have any memories you would like to display as an embroidered cushion?

Here are my tutorials for...

1. Designing an embroidered cushion

2. Embroidery basics so you can sew your cushion

Have a great day!

Love Rebecca

Embroidery Basics - Stitches for an Embroidered Cushion

Yesterday I shared a How to Guide to Designing you own Embroidery Cushion. Today, I am going to prove to you how easy it is to embroider it by teaching you the four stitches that I used on my cushion. The first stitch, back stitch, is very straight forward and is the stitch I use most when embroidering.

Note - in the tutorial I use the measurement 'half a centimetre' a lot - this is a rough estimate of a stitch size - simply judge the size of your stitch for your given project for this instruction!

I hope you find this useful! If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask!

Back Stitch

This stitch is perfect for general embroidery, words, outlines of shapes etc.

 1. Thread needle up from the back at your starting point

2.Finish first stitch by stitching down about half a centimetre

3. Bring needle back up about half a centimetre away from end of first stitch

4. Bring needle down in the same place that you ended your first stitch

5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 to get another stitch. Repeat until your design is complete.

 

Satin stitch

This stitch is perfect for filling in parts of your design

1. Bring needle up at starting point

2. Take needle down directly across from your starting point, as per your design

3. Bring your needle back up just under starting point

4. Complete stitch by finishing just under first stitch, as in the picture

5. Repeat this stitch, staying very close together to fill in your shape

6. To neaten the edges, bring the needle up at one end of you filled in design

7. Take the needle down at the other end, this creates a neat border and tidies in any uneven stitches

8. Repeat on the other side

Chain Stitch

I like this stitch as it adds some variation to the standard back stitch

1. Bring needle up at start point. Take down again very close and bring up about half a centimetre away, as in the picture, leave the needle in place.

2. Bring thread round needle as shown

3. Pull the needle through to finish the stitch

4.Start the next stitch by going down at the end of the first stitch and coming back up half a centimetre later. Loop thread round as in step 2 and complete stitch. 

5. Repeat stitches until you have a chain

Double Chain Stitch

This is a decorative stitch - I used it to outline the MET on my cushion, to create a frame effect

1. Bring needle up at starting point

2. Take needle down, about half a centimetre to the right and bring up half a centimetre vertically, as shown in the picture. Loop the thread under the needle. Pull through

2. For second stitch, take needle under/bring back up where you originally started, back on the opposite side. Loop the thread round and pull through. For third stitch, switch back to right side, starting at the end of the last stitch.

 3. Repeat until you have a double chain as desired

And that is it! With these stitches, you will be able to create your very own embroidered cushion! I would love to see if you give this a go yourself!

Have a great day

Love Rebecca

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Step by Step Guide for Designing an Embroidered Cushion

I got a really positive response from my New York embroidered cushion and I am happy to say that I do have a few more planned in this style, based on different locations.

I also received some encouragement to produce a tutorial based on this, so today I am offering a step by step guide to designing your very own embroidered cushion.
You don;t have to be an amazing artist or talented embroiderer to give this project a go - all you need is patience as it is quite time-consuming - but, in my opinion, totally worth it!

 1. Decide where you are going to base your cushion on - this can be somewhere you have visited - a country, a city or a whole trip

2. Next, brainstorm some prominent landmarks that will feature in picture form on your cushion. Remember you are going to embroider these, so try to think of things that can be reproduced simply.

3. Either sketch, or print out and trace, pictures of the landmarks. I used the tracing technique for the Empire State Building, Brooklyn Bridge and Statue of Liberty. This was mainly to get proportions right, and as you can see from the picture, I simplified the pictures substantially

4. Trim an A3 piece of paper into a square shape. Write out the name of the place you are representing on your cushion in block writing. Again, you could trace this from word art if you wanted a particular font.

5. Position your sketches on you square piece of paper. Start to fill in the gaps with words - these can be districts, sports teams, rivers, street names. Think about sizes, fonts and ways to add some information about the place in your design - you can also add little doodles to help illustrate. For example....

The Big Apple

The MET

The Yankees

Central Park

Taxi

NOTE - it doesn't matter if these change when you sew, I realised my NYPD police had was complex and would turn out unrecognisable so replaced it with the letters NYPD instead!

Try to fill you cushion so there are no gaping gaps. It will not look very striking at this point as you have no colour! Once you are happy, outline everything in black fine liner.

6. Trace your design onto calico fabric.

7. Start to embroider - for full instructions on the embroidery techniques I needed for this cushion, stop back tomorrow!

I would love to see your designs or cushions if you decide to give this a go!

Love Rebecca

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