Embroidery Software and Fabric

Posted by on March 14, 2014

Happy Thursday Friday! Sometimes it takes me a day or two to get a post up…  I am so excited to post about a “new” product I am now selling on the website!! No, not all of the cute and simple applique designs even though I AM excited about selling those too. I am now selling the wonderful, affordable, not really new, but easy-to-use embroidery software I have been recommending to anyone who asks or will listen for the past several years. SEW WHAT-PRO!

What do I use it for? Mainly I use it for merging a name or initials with an applique design. An example is below. I formatted the name “andrew” in Monogram Wizard Plus (font is Kazoo). I save it to my computer. I open SWP and OPEN the new fish design and then MERGE in the saved name. I then arrange it all and center the whole design and then put it on my machine to sew! There is a lot more you can do with SWP, but that’s my main use for it.

ALSO, I use it even when I’m just sewing an applique design with NO NAME. I like to *SEE* what I am sewing on my computer screen, so I open all of my files in SWP so I can see them. You can click on the thread chart on the right and see which step is next! You can also use SWP to delete parts of a design. A lot of people also use it to merge bought embroidery fonts together. When you buy embroidery fonts on the internet (NOT using a monogram software such as Monogram Wiz Plus), each letter is it’s own file, so you have to merge the letters together to form a name or initials. SWP can do that!

Please check it out on my website (Sew What-Pro) if you are looking for software such as this! It’s only $65 and it’s the best $65 I’ve ever spent. There is more info on the listing and also a manual you can download to look over.

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I had several people ask me where this Footprint design came from from a previous post. I did this design on some burp cloths for a local ministry so the design was sent to me. Thank you to my blog reader who reported where the design can be found! It looks like it’s part of a set, but maybe you could email the website and just get this design? You can find it HERE. (ps designs are a little pricey compared to American sites?)

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Now on to FABRIC! Last weekend the fam traveled to Destin, FL for a soccer tournament for my middle child. We normally take a route which leads us through Troy (AL), around Elba and someway here and there we end up at the beach. Well, there was road construction somewhere near Elba and we ended up NOT going the way we had planned. When I realized we were heading towards Opp, AL, I got excited b/c TJ’s Fabrics is in Opp! I had not been through there in a long time and was overwhelmed by all of the beautiful fabric that has now taken over the store! Last time I was there 1/2 the store was fabric and 1/2 was gifts and drug store type items. This time, fabric was everywhere!! Everything is arranged by colors and chevrons and I could have spent all day there had the kids and hubs not been waiting in the car. Lucky for you, they have an awesome website so if you aren’t in Alabama or traveling through the area, you can order online. If you ARE traveling to the beach (Destin, Panama City Beach, Seagrove/Seaside, etc) then DETOUR!! Plug it in the GPS and stop by, and tell TJ I said “HI”!! 🙂

My selfie for 2014! I will let the pictures speak for themselves…..

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See what I mean? This is just HALF of the store! They also have a studio room (right side of photo) where they do classes and quilting and all that. Oh, you can still get a prescription filled there too! 😉

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I’ll take one of each….

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Chevron for days…..

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Here’s what I left with! I can NEVER have enough polka dots! These are Michael Miller “Kiss Dots”. I may have kissed them…

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Sissy with some other pretties!

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Fat quarter bundles ready for you to grab and go!

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More chevrons….

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These are Susybee Bunny Dashes & Carrots. Easter is a little over a month away!

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Our Jellyfish 2 design! I believe they are also sewing and doing appliques & monogramming for customers!

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Michael Miller Diddly Dot Primary! So cute!!

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They also have gobs of blanks!

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More pretty colors…

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I’ve had my eye on these since I saw them on Facebook! These are Riley Blake, Summer Breeze.

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Again, if you are traveling to Florida this summer and coming anywhere near South Alabama, stop by!

I hope to get a more detailed post up soon on Sew What-Pro and how I use it! It’s been a busy week so stay tuned…

One last thing, because there is nothing more disheartening to post something and get no love!!

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Filed Under: Applique Cafe, Fabric, Shopping, Software | Tagged: Tagged With: , , ,

Let it Snow!

Posted by on February 4, 2014

Happy Tuesday! As I type this post, it’s 51 degrees in Montgomery (AL). This time last week we were awaiting SNOW. Snow doesn’t happen here very often. The last time it snowed was February 2010. I actually found on my blog that it also snowed a little in March of 2009. Thank goodness for blogs! Anyway, last week it snowed and the kids were out of school for 3 days. We were back in shorts and t-shirts Sunday! Here are some of the photos I took. I think these were taken Wednesday after it finally snowed Tuesday evening (after the kids waited allll dayyyy Tuesday for some flakes). You may have seen or heard of how horrible things were in Birmingham and Atlanta (traffic, people sleeping at work and in schools, etc), but in Montgomery all was well and we were basically stuck at home for 3 days (but all safe)!!

Maggie didn’t mind the snow. At first she tip toed around quickly to do her thing, but seemed to enjoy it.

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The kids had the most fun on the trampoline. As you can see, we here in Alabama don’t really have snow clothes. What you see are layers of clothes on them which got soaking wet and all had to be washed 18 times.

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A little action shot of Mags.

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This is our garage. The icicles came before the snow!

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In the south, we also don’t have sleds or sleighs. These are boogie boards we usually take to the beach every summer. They worked pretty well! Where I live is also pretty flat, but we ventured across the street to the golf course and found a few hills.

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This would be a snowed over sand trap.

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Of course everyone in the state of Alabama made a snow angel!

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Even though all the laundry and mess made me a little crazy (and being cooped up inside for 3 days), I know the kids loved every minute of it and will probably never forget the snowball fights with Jeff or “sledding” on the golf course. Yes, that is snot running down Mallory’s nose.

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“G”

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Browder

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All is back to normal now and the snow is long gone! Not a lot else going on around here other than school and the usual stuff! Valentine’s is next Friday, so we put our Valentine Designs (as well as Mardi Gras and St. Patrick’s Day) on sale. Check them out at Applique Cafe! Have a great week ~ new designs coming soon!

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Filed Under: Applique Cafe, Family | Tagged: Tagged With:

Before and After

Posted by on January 20, 2014

Happy Monday! It’s a beautiful day in Alabama ~ sunny and 66 ~ and the kids are out of school and are outside playing. Perfect day to be inside sewing and doing a blog post, huh? This weekend Jeff took Sissy to a Father Daughter Dance. This is one of 100,000,000 reasons I thank God for giving us a little girl. Such a fun night and I think I had more fun shopping for this dance than anything. You won’t find much fancy and shiny in Mallory’s closet, but on this night I had to find the perfect dress. After searching high and low for a dress with a decent price tag that she would probably only wear once, I found this one at Belk. Can’t beat the sale dress with an add’l 40% off. Believe me, there are some tacky dresses out there. It’s hard to find decent, cute girl clothes once you bypass the toddler sizes. Anyway, they had a ball and here are a couple of pics!

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My two girls!! Love love love them!!

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Now on to what I have really been up to lately. We have roughly 750 designs on our website. For the past several months, I have been going through some of the old designs and either editing the web photos to remove the background, or re-sewing the design altogether. It’s amazing what fresh fabrics will do! I use Photoshop Elements to remove the background of my photos. I test stitch all of our samples usually on a double layer of medium cutaway stabilizer (5×7, PES designs). Sometimes if I have a shirt then I sew it on a shirt. I try to take my web photos outside in good sunlight (I have a Canon Rebel xsi), then I crop & edit them in a program called Photoscape, which is free. I then use Photoshop Elements to remove the background from the image. This is tedious work and the whole web photo process is why it sometimes takes us 3 days to get a new design listed.  I use both programs because I am not savvy enough to just use PE. I also use Photoscape to add the watermark (www.appliquecafe.com) to my photos. All you do is add text!

Here are a few examples of some BEFORE & AFTER shots of some of our older designs. This is our Bird on Vine design which has been around for a long long time. I re-sewed it on a Sassy Kid Blanks Candy Pink A-Line dress and it looks soooooo much better! If you missed it, see my RECENT POST about Sassy Kid Blanks and all they have to offer. There’s nothing really wrong with the old picture and this has been a popular design, but the background is a little dark and as you can see below, the design looks great on the pink dress.

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Love love love this design on this dress! This is the 5×7 design on a size 6 dress.

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This is our Birthday Cake design before & after. The background on the left is super dark, and it just needed a makeover. Again, this is an older design (#109 out of like 750). Doesn’t the new web photo look SOOO much better? When I say “remove the background”, I mean I remove the stabilizer or shirt or whatever the design is stitched on. It really makes the design itself stick out.

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Here is our Birthday Hat (girl) design and this was one of the very first designs we did (#4). My old web photo (left) was way too dark. I probably took it inside and it definitely looks better with some new fabric and a better, brighter photo.

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I think this is one of my favorites. This is our Mittens design. The left photo is dark and the fabrics are kind of blahhhh. It looks 200X better with brighter fabrics and an edited photo.

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I’m slowly getting all of the designs edited with no backgrounds and a few more re-sewn that need makeovers. I hope it makes a difference! I’m stitching our Lion design now, and our Rudolph is next even though Christmas is a long way away.

Photos make all the difference in selling your product! Try to get outside on a sunny day and take your photos. Props are good too if you are selling a dress or a shirt (like my dress form above). Hang your shirt from a tree, or the vinyl photo backdrops are popular now too. Search for them on Etsy.com!

Check out ALL DESIGNS on our website to see how our photos look! Have a great week!

Filed Under: Applique Cafe, Design, How To, Software | Tagged: Tagged With: ,
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