Add Some Heat with Sweet Dreams

Hi everyone:

My last post was about the Heritage Park Festival of Quilts. I was helping out at the Quilter's Connection magazine booth and did a demo of my latest pattern, Sweet Dreams. I'm pleased to let you know that this design is available as a FREE pattern on my website for the next 2 months. 

Sweet Dreams by Chatterbox Quilts

 It's my first pattern using my HEAT process: Hand Embroidery Appliqué Technique. This fusion of two techniques (hand embroidery and fusible web appliqué) has been a natural evolution of the work that I've been doing over the past year or so. 

 My first love is appliqué, specifically fusible web appliqué, since it's fast and easy - my two favourite words when I'm referring to quilting, but I've been drawn more and more to hand embroidery recently. I also find this fast and easy, although I don't think it would be as quick if I were doing an entire embroidery project. So, how am I using hand embroidery in an appliqué project, you ask? Well, let me tell you...

Detail of Sweet Dreams

I use hand embroidery as an enhancement to my appliqué project. Some appliqué details are too small to be made from fabric, so I add hand embroidery stitches for these finer details. 

Detail of Sweet Dreams

I typically use perle cotton in various weights, but embroidery floss works as well. I guess I'm just a perle cotton snob! I also find that I can add so much more texture and interest to a project with just a few simple embroidery stitches and they really don't take much time to complete.

Moon and star details of Sweet Dreams

I hope you'll download Sweet Dreams and try my HEAT process. If you've never tried hand embroidery before, this is a great project to introduce you to this technique. Don't forget to download it before the end of July 2013, since it will no longer be available as a free pattern after that date.