Patches
I made a bunch of patches just last week for baseball hats. What I
did was to use washable felt and just plain tear-away for the backing.
I embroidered the bobcat on the felt then trimmed the black felt kind of
close. Then I took a lighter and seared the edges. After that I just
glued them to the hats. I was having trouble with the ears not staying
down so I just put a couple of stitches in by hand to take care of that.
The bobcat was outlined in black and I used black felt so you could
not see the felt. It looked like it was embroidered right on the hat.
For the back of the hat they wanted the word (DUMAS) on them. So what I
did was to do a oval. I put a gold fill in the middle with the word
Dumas done in purple with a gold satin stitch on the outside. I also
trimmed real close and used the lighter to sear the edges. Then I just
stitched these on with my sewing machine.
The hats turned out real nice and the coach really liked them. He
also sent me a picture of the bobcat he wanted to use and I digitized it
for him.
Quindy in Arkansas
I'm using twill (I really don't know fabrics, but it's a heavy cotton
that closely matches the patches I've won for bowling) as my fabric and
a heavy tear-away stabilizer. The combination is very stiff, just like
the originals.
Hoop the tear-away only.
Place the twill loosely on the tear-away (trimmed to fit easily)
I use a light underlay on all my patches, so I stitch that first to
avoid using adhesive. Then I do the outline and " Set Applique=E9 " .
When the machine stops at the " Set Applique=E9 " command, trim the twill to
final size as close as possible to the outline. This is critical and
greatly affects the final overall quality.
Finish stitching the pattern. There should be a satin stitch outline to
finish the patch. I've started making it 4 mm wide with at least 1.5 mm
outside the manual outline area. The idea here is to make absolutely
certain that the satin stitch goes past the outer edge of the twill into
the tear-away. That is what makes the whole thing work!
Remove the patch from the hoop. Tear away. Use a lighter or candle to
burn away the " hair " of the tear-away to make a totally clean, neat
satin stitch edge that's much better looking than the normal serged
edge!
Willy Pichler
To do patches,here is my suggestion:
Hoop several layers of regular solvy, or one layer of the heavy Aqua Film. Set up your manual stitches, and stitch a circle, I like to go around the circle twice, right next to each other close. Then go up and hit " Set Applique " Then save as something like AplqCir. That way, when you need a patch you have it ready. You may have to scale it up or down, but it's ready. Then go to " Paste from " and put your design in the center of the circle.
Now, after that is set, EU already has satin stitched circles, You just
have to " Paste from " and choose the circle, and resize it to the size of
your manual stitched circle. Then save as the completed design.
When you go to stitch out the design,lay the fabric you want the patch out of on top of the solve. And when you start stitching it will stop after the manual circle. Take the hoop off the machine, and trim the fabric close to the manual stitches. When it stitches the satin stitch circle, it will cover the raw edges. Hope this helps.
Sue Hager
I'm lazier than Sue and use the standard issue manual stitches under our satin stitch circles. Select and copy the manual applique circles, save as one name, then select and copy the satin circles and save as the second name. IF your patch will be large and the enlarged satins are too thin for a decent border, use the manual circle as a guide and 90 degree shift-key angle feature to designate a satin circle of a better width by clicking with the right mouse.
Mary
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