Monthly Archive for August, 2009

Too Fun! My class this last Thursday with Bobbie Bergquist was every thing I had hoped for.  Bobbie walked us through quick and easy techniques for creating unique fabric.  She provided guidance on technique and encouraged creativity.  The class was an offering at The Sewing, Quilting and Stitches Expo at the Sharonville Convention Center in Sharonville, OH.

Bobbie started us off with a pallet of shaving cream with drops of ink.

The ink is dispersed into the shaving cream using a toothpick or coffee stir stick.  Once the artist is happy with the dispersion a piece of fabric is placed on top. The fabric is lightly smoothed and lifted.  Excess shaving cream is removed and the surprise fabric is revealed.

The ink dries quickly and requires heat setting.

The shaving cream removed from the fabric and left behind on the palette was then used for stenciling and silk screen.  More paint or shaving cream could be added to manipulate the colors and intensity of the pallet.

Bobbie has a variety of stencils and silk screen items for testing and playing.

Tone on Tone fabric was used for the playing and created wonderful and interesting life on the fabric.

Here are more creations from the class.

Pens can be used to enhance the stenciling and silk screen.

How fun is this.

The three hour class went by quickly and was a lot of fun!

The supplies used were Tsukineko inks and pens, a pallet board,  squeegee, fabrics squares and lots of creativity and imagination.  If you have a chance to take a class with Bobbie jump on it.  You won’t be disappointed.

Here’s a link to her web site, Quilters Treasure,  if you’d like to check out her work and show schedule: http://www.quilterstreasure.com/index.html

A special thanks to Bobbie and all of the students for allowing me to take pictures.

Sew Soon.

LIN

Help! This is a plea we hear often.  Whether there is a need to get through a particular task or working through learning something new.  I’ve heard it often with the 4D Embroidery software.  I like helping and enjoy the challenge to explain something or figure out a function.  I often find the answers to the question by reading through the help within 4D.  This week I’d like to share the features and functions of Help within the 4D software.

The Help function can be accessed from any of the 4D modules  The Help content is different based upon the module but the function of the Help features are the same.  You can access help by clicking on the Help icon or pressing F1.

Here is the Help panel that pops up.

There are four tabs on the Help screen to assist you. They are: Contents, Index, Search and Favorites.

CONTENT TAB

The Content tab is file organized.  Notice the little + signs in front of each Content item.  Click on the + sign to open the Content items below. Some of the content topics have multiple layers.

Use the scroll bar to navigate through the list.

Double click on any topic to view the content on the right side.

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INDEX TAB

The Index  tab is topic organized in alphabetical order.

Type in a keyword to find specific topics.

Use the scroll bar to navigate through the list.

Double click on any topic to view the content on the right side.

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SEARCH TAB

The Search  tab lists topics associated with key words.

Enter a key work for the topic you are interestedin and hit enter or click List Topics.

Use the scroll bar to navigate through the list.

Double click on any topic to view the content on the right side.

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FAVORITES TAB

The Favorites  tab lists topics saved to the favorites list.

Once you’ve selected a topic on the Contents, Index or Search tab move to the Favorites tab and select Add.

To view Favorit topics, move to the Favorites tab and double click on any topic to view the content on the right side.

Use Remove topics to remove topics form the list, select the topic and click Remove.

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There is a lot of information in Help.  Spending time to just read and review will build you 4D knowledge quickly and it’s fun!

Sew soon.

LIN

I was talking about blogging with my DH/BF (dear husband/best friend) the other day.  He’s an avid blogger and keeps several sites active with information and photography.  He’s a huge source of information for me and is my go to guy for any trouble or tweaking I want to do on my site.  As we were talking he mentioned he was about to publish his umpteenth post.  I thought wow, that’s a lot.  I wonder how many I have.

I’ve been blogging regularly since the beginning of 2008 so I knew it wasn’t quite two years.  I occasionally will post more than once a week but for the most part it is weekly.  Well, as you can tell this week the number is 94.  That’s just a few posts away from 100.  I think I’ll need to do something special for the 100th post.  Perhaps a review of the good the bad and well . . .the experience.

For this week I thought I’d ask what you like about the site. What do you like, what don’t you like.  Are there particular posting that were particularly enlightening? Let me know.

The one thing I do want to share with you this week is one of the tools on my web site.  Just to the right there is a search box.   The title Search LinSews is right above the box.

The search function is an easy way to find prior posts on a particular subject.  Do you want to know about Resize or Scale? Put in the key word and watch the lessons show up on the page.  Perhaps you wanted a refresher on Encore or color change.  Maybe you want to know what lessons are available on Stitch Editor or Organizer.  Just enter in the key word and wait for the search engine to provide the results. It is a pretty sweet tool.  I use it often and hope you will too.

Sew soon.

LIN