{"id":21249,"date":"2012-03-03T22:22:14","date_gmt":"2012-03-04T03:22:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/?p=21249"},"modified":"2014-12-26T19:38:37","modified_gmt":"2014-12-27T00:38:37","slug":"new-brother-quattro-new-smockingtechnique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/2012\/03\/03\/new-brother-quattro-new-smockingtechnique\/","title":{"rendered":"New Brother Quattro! New SmockingTechnique!"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"my<\/a>

my new baby!<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

NEW MACHINE!!!<\/strong><\/em>\u00c2\u00a0 If you have heard happy shouts and contented purrs coming from central Florida, it’s just me.\u00c2\u00a0 I am beside myself with delight over my new Brother Quattro!\u00c2\u00a0 After my disappointment over the misplaced design<\/a> on a collar for my granddaughter, I knew that wouldn’t have happened if I had been sewing on the Brother Quattro.\u00c2\u00a0 So now, this big Brother lives in my sewing room!\u00c2\u00a0 Hurrah!<\/p>\n

When I stitched that design on my Brother Duetta, I had hooped heavy water soluble stabilizer, applied spray adhesive and placed the “V” shaped collar in place.\u00c2\u00a0 In fact, I had centered the design properly, with the needle penetrating the absolute center of the design.\u00c2\u00a0 But the linen collar was not absolutely straight,\u00c2\u00a0 north and south, east and west.\u00c2\u00a0 This caused the “V” design to lean to the east.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"collar-close\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Brother Duetta stitched it perfectly, but my operator error caused the misplacement.<\/p>\n

This slight misalignment would not have been so noticeable had the collar been round or square or if it had been stitched on a yoke.\u00c2\u00a0 But with the echoed “V” so near, it was very obvious.<\/p>\n

The Quattro has a built in camera.\u00c2\u00a0 With this incredible feature, the\u00c2\u00a0 camera locates the cross hairs of the “snowman” sticker that is placed at the very center of my design area.\u00c2\u00a0 The camera perceives even slight placement inaccuracies and makes the correction by rotating the design however many degrees are necessary.\u00c2\u00a0 Is that not wonderful and amazing?<\/p>\n

We are in the “getting to know you” mode right now and the more I read, the more awestruck I am.\u00c2\u00a0 Edge sewing, print and stitch, huge embroideries…… The list goes on and on.\u00c2\u00a0 I can’t wait for Quattro and me to become BFF’s!<\/p>\n

NEW TECHNIQUE!!<\/strong><\/em>! My granddaughter’s Easter dress seemed to be an appropriate first project to help us get acquainted.\u00c2\u00a0 Pictures of “shadow smocking,”\u00c2\u00a0 posted on Pinterest caught my eye.\u00c2\u00a0 Note: If you don’t know about Pinterest, check it out here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

The technique was introduced by Pat Garretson in a Sew Beautiful<\/em> article in the spring, 1998 issue.\u00c2\u00a0 At the time, my youngest was a freshman at University of Florida, so I overlooked the article.\u00c2\u00a0 But now I am intrigued.\u00c2\u00a0 This scan is one page in the article.\u00c2\u00a0 Do you love these as much as I do?\u00c2\u00a0 Have any of you ever done this?\u00c2\u00a0 If so, please tell us about it!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"shadow<\/a>

shadow smocking photo from Sew Beautiful<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Laurel’s dress will be very much like the dress on the left, smocked 12 rows down from the shoulder.\u00c2\u00a0 Basically, the curve template on\u00c2\u00a0 the center fold is traced onto the shadow fabric, then stitched and cut away to the stitching line.<\/p>\n

According to the directions, the shadow fabric is to be cut along the template lines then placed on the foundation fabric.\u00c2\u00a0 The two are then zig zagged together along the curved bottom.<\/p>\n

Much as I like to follow directions carefully when trying a new technique, I knew that I would have problems doing it that way. \u00c2\u00a0 So I traced, then placed the two pieces together, straight stitched on the template line and then trimmed away the excess fabric.\u00c2\u00a0 Finally, I worked the zig zag with 80 wt. Madeira Cotona, L 1.0 W 1.5.\u00c2\u00a0 The quiet Quattro stitched beautifully and just felt good.<\/p>\n

But I had to abort the first pleating attempt.\u00c2\u00a0 The two pieces shifted, perhaps in part because the shadow fabric is “fairy” batiste, very, very sheer.<\/p>\n

Before my second pleating attempt, I applied spray adhesive to the foundation fabric and carefully smoothed the shadow fabric over it.\u00c2\u00a0 This was not easy, as there always seemed to be bumps.\u00c2\u00a0 The spray adhesive released enough that I could reposition the shadow fabric again and again.<\/p>\n

A row of straight stitch was also worked along the top, straight edge.\u00c2\u00a0 Then the pleating went well.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"shadow<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And that’s where I am now, waiting to start the back smocking.<\/p>\n

As you can see from the Sew Beautiful<\/em> photo, the sleeves also featured a row of shadow smocking.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"shadow<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I did get down to the nitty gritty of heirloom sewing by testing the Quattro’s pin stitch on the sleeve.\u00c2\u00a0 Like all the Brother machine pin stitches, it is perfect.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Pinstitch,<\/a>

Pinstitch, #304 on ULT’s, Duetta and Quattro, worked with L. 2.5 & W. 2.5. I usually pinstitch at a width of 2.0, but this lace has a wide header, requiring a wider width to cover it.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Our grandchildren gave been here since Wed. , and we are exhausted from laughing and chasing after them.\u00c2\u00a0 Every day we thank God for the blessing of having them in our lives.<\/p>\n

Alastair has his 3rd birthday this week. Six year old Robert learned to open, microwave and serve himself his favorite personal pan pizza. Almost 8 year old Laurel confided to me that she prefers skirts and tops to dresses.\u00c2\u00a0 Sigh….they are growing up and out of my favorite children’s clothing so fast.\u00c2\u00a0 I hope Laurel will still be pleased with this last little girl Easter dress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  NEW MACHINE!!!\u00c2\u00a0 If you have heard happy shouts and contented purrs coming from central Florida, it’s just me.\u00c2\u00a0 I am beside myself with delight over my new Brother Quattro!\u00c2\u00a0 After my disappointment over the misplaced design on a collar … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":21457,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[28,24,38,1],"tags":[1062,358,209,175,247],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21249"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21249"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32450,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21249\/revisions\/32450"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21457"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.janicefergusonsews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}