April Stitchalong: week 4

My cupcake is finished! I decided to give my cupcake some bushy brows and put some sprinkles in the background. He's more of a worried cupcake, but I thinks he's suitably crazy and fun-looking as well. :)

I made a last-minute decision to add some stuffing to my cupcake, and I like the smooshy 3d quality it added:


And I have a couple more awesome cupcakes to show you! This one hails from Lauren R - I LOVE the eyes and the contrasty colors she used:



Also in the psychedelic vein is this cool cupcake by MadameUgly:


Well, this post wraps up the April Stitchalong with Love and a Sandwich's awesome Monster Cupcake. Thanks again, Chelsea, for designing something so fun to stitch!

Again, it's never too late to join in, so download your pattern and stitch away if you'd like to stitch your own!


Download the PDF
Week One
Week Two
Week Three

Just tag your photos "AprilStitchalong2012" and add them to the Embroidery group, so we can all see them! Thanks, all for an awesome stitch along, and stay tuned because we've got some fun stuff up our sleeve for our next stitchalongs! :)

April Stitchalong: week 3

Today I am submitting photographic proof (with my new sheets as a backdrop) that I am working on my cupcake, albeit slowly....



He's all cut out and ready to stitch, I just haven't sewed him down yet. Hey, I can't help it - you guys keep posting such fun cupcakes to the pool and I keep getting distracted by them!

For instance, I'm really loving the look of alarm on this cupcake and cherry:


This cute little guy by kafka89 looks chocolate-y and delicious:


Look at this adorable guy stitched by Leilani:


I love how you've all been playing with the placement of the eyes, as that really changes Monster cupcake's whole expression, and you're not afraid to do some fun fabric combinations!

Want to join us? You have one more week to stitch a cupcake and add it to the pool!




Download the PDF
Week One
Week Two

Dont forget to tag your photos "AprilStitchalong2012" and add them to the Embroidery group, so we can all see them!

April Stitchalong: week 2

photo by Animerae

Well I was super-excited to see so much progress on April's stitchalong - Love and a Sandwich's Monster cupcake! I've got my pieces all cut out, but I think I'll start by showing you all the gems that have been uploaded in the pool so far...

First up is Animerae's fierce little purple cupcake:



I love how LaWhimsy sketches out her ideas and includes her drawings in her pictures:

I'm glad she stitched out of her comfort zone and made this cute little cupcake her own. :)


Look at this cutie stitched by Luciana!

He looks sort of like a happy little gnome cupcake, and I love the shiny bead sprinkles.


Little Red Emo Hood stitched an adorable version on pink gingham:



And I love the pillow pinkaleen made with her cupcake pattern:



Is all of this inspiring you to stitch your own cupcake? I don't know about you but I'm hungry for more cupcakes!



You can also use Chelsea's drawing as a guide to arrange your pieces:


Download the PDF
Week One

Dont forget to tag your photos "AprilStitchalong2012" and add them to the Embroidery group, so we can all see them!

Oh, and yes, your eyes do not fool you - we've finally taken the plunge and are using Disqus for our comments. Some of you have had a hard time commenting since Blogger changed their system, and Disqus offers lots of cool options to keep a conversation going. I'm hoping this will make it even easier for you to share your thoughts with us! Any comments made before today are temporarily invisible while they migrate into Disqus - but everything should be synced up within a week, I hope. Any new comments should show up right away, so feel free to give us a test comment today!

April Stitchalong: Love and a Sandwich

This month's stitchalong pattern was created by the incredibly awesome Chelsea of Love and a Sandwich. From monsters to robots to cupcakes, she embroiders it all. She also does a series of posts on MrXStitch called Plush Love (and a Sandwich). Her style is bright, colorful, and crazy fun. If you read Feeling Stitchy, you've seen her work before - we featured a time lapse of her embroidery process, and we interviewed her here.

Here's Chelsea's monster cupcake tutorial, from start to finish!



Step 1: Original sketch, I just traced the hoop I wanted to use and drew inside it to create my pattern.
(If you're working from the template, use your embroidery hoop as a guide and enlarge or shrink your cupcake accordingly.)




Step 2: Materials - you'll need:
embroidery hoop
felt
cotton fabric
tiny plastic beads (for cherry's eyes)
black and white embroidery floss
sewing thread
pins
needle






Step 3: Cut out the pattern pieces!
I left a little extra on the ends of the smaller pieces that needed to go underneath the bigger pieces so they were easier to sew down.




Step 4: Applique!
I purposely didn't sew down certain parts, like the brown parts of the eyes, and the bottom of the white on the cupcake, to make it look more 3D.




Step 5: Used embroidery thread to make the lines in the cupcake holder, and the little cherry's mouth. Used tiny plastic beads for their eyes, but doing little french knots would work too! I drew out lightly with pen where I wanted the lines to go before I used the thread.




Step 6: Cut the Sprinkles!
I purposely chose colors that were already in my hoop, plus the green & yellow because they were bright.




Step 7: Carefully arranged and appliqued the sprinkles, only used 2 stitches on each one. Tacky glue would work as well.




Step 8: Traced the hoop on felt to use as a backing. Hot glued down all the fabric edges (watch her video for an example of this), and then glued down the red felt with my little label.




Finished cupcake!

Thank you Chelsea! Are you guys ready to join in? I bet you are! I traced over Chelsea's drawing, to make a template:



Feel free to use Chelsea's drawing as a guide to arrange all your pieces:


Download the PDF

Remember, this is your cupcake, so stitch it exactly as you like - leave things off, add things, change the colors, with or without sprinkles - get creative!

As you stitch, be sure to snap photos, tag them "AprilStitchalong2012" and add them to the Embroidery group. I'll be checking in with you guys this month, and sharing your work (and mine!)

April Stitchalong... sneak peek!

In case you were wondering, we are indeed doing a stitch along this April - it's a custom pattern by someone very awesome... I can't show the whole thing to you just yet, but maybe this little sneak peek will hold you over until Saturday? :)