My favorite thread colors!

Posted by on March 11, 2011

Here is a birthday gift I did for one of G’s friends. Might as well utilize my talents! This is a beach towel from Target ($6.99) and a little pool toy to go along with it (because let’s face it, a 5 year old is NOT going to get too excited about a monogrammed beach towel). These are great little beach towels and I love the orange on the lime & white stripes!

Happy Spring to me! A week or so ago I asked Jeff to vacuum our nasty den rug. He then asked me when the last time I used our vacuum cleaner was. I couldn’t remember, so I gave it a whirl. I could barely push it! Our poor poor cleaning lady!! She’s been schlepping that thing around for who knows how long and you could seriously barely push it! So, I took a poll on Facebook and most recommended Oreck or Dyson in the realm of vacuum cleaners. We have an Oreck store near my house (2 doors down from Tips, our fave mexican restaurant) so we ended up with the Oreck. Who knew a new vacuum cleaner could be so exciting? Oreck’s selling point is that they are SIMPLE and lightweight! Sold!! Jeff asked me last night if I was going to store it in our garage like we did the other old vacuum. I thought Browder’s bed might be a better choice based on what we paid for it! But, it’ll be well worth it and should last forever!

And now to the embroidery part of this post. THREAD COLORS! Did you know that some stores sell ACTUAL thread charts (with real life thread samples)? I got the Isacord chart from www.sewingmachine.com (West Point store) when I was there in October. I got the Exquisite (formerly Poly-X) from www.kenssewingcenter.com (may not be listed on their site but call and see if they have any). They also sell (or give away?) printed thread charts, but ask for a REAL thread chart!

As you can see the samples are real pieces and the red * means they are available in 5000M spools (versus 1000M spools or the regular size spools). Again, Exquisite is the new name for Poly-X and the thread numbers are the same. The spool is still green; the only difference is the sticker on top is white now and says Exquisite.

My boys assisted me (on this windy day) of showing you the whole chart! The Isacord chart looks the same! I use and love both of these brands and highly recommend them! A lot of my 1000M spools are Poly-X and most of my 5000M spools are Isacord. Again, I love both!

Here are some of my favorite colors! The left is a celery green and I use it all the time! It DOES NOT come in the 5000M spool, so last time I reordered it I got 5 X 1000M spools. That’s how much I use it! I would call it a pea or celery green. The middle is that watermelon-y pink color – it goes great with the Riley Blake Quite Contrary fabrics. I also use the ES983 with the Quite Contrary green fabrics. The right is a good darker lime?? green.

These are all Isacord. Lime green (dark), turquoise and a butter yellow (not bright yellow).

Pinks are HARD! 2520 is a great HOT PINK, 2530 is a good BUBBLEGUM PINK, 2560 – a little lighter bubble gum pink and lastly, 2155 is a light pink but has some yellow in it. The middle 2 have some blue in them I would say. I use them all quite a bit! Again, all ISACORD below…

Lastly, more ISACORD. The left lime is my FAVORITE! Unfortunately it’s one of those that doesn’t come in a 5000M spool and I buy it locally at Kudzu Quilt (Bernina dealership/quilt shop). Middle – that great light turquoise/tealish color. We all know I love orange and this is the orange I used on the beach towel above.

We are now officially off for SPRING BREAK! We celebrated after school at Nancy’s Italian Ice. If you look at her website that is my oldest front & center. He ended his 7th birthday party at Nancy’s last May and we frequent there at least once a week. I go hang out there with the kids when my house shows and have been known to plug my phone in the wall and sit for a while. We love some Nancy’s!

I have one more shirt to do for the day so back to work… hope the thread post helps! I will touch on some other colors another day!

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Thread and Hoops!

Posted by on January 3, 2011
I hope this doesn’t look too gross? Yesterday was New Year’s Day. In the SOUTH, we take the ham bone from the ham we’ve been eating every other meal for the past week, throw it in a pot and throw in a bag of BLACK EYED PEAS!! We don’t/didn’t do the “greens”, but hopefully the BEP’s will bring us good luck in 2011! If this picture didn’t make you shut down my blog, then read on…
Today I “organized” my thread on the floor. I have both 1000M spools and 5000M spools. I’m working on a thread order so I had to sort all the colors and figure out what I needed. I use mostly Poly X thread from www.kenssewingcenter.com (and I have a gift certificate to use) and also Isacord from www.sewingmachine.com (most of my 5000M spools are Isacord). I like both brands and my machine seems to like them too. I have REAL thread charts for both brands with real thread samples, so it makes ordering very easy. I’m trying to build up my collection of 5000M spools, especially on the colors I use most.
Isn’t thread fun??
Tonight I made a Walmart run for diapers (Mal still sleeps in them unfortunately) and a dust pan. I came out with diapers, a dust pan, an 8 pack of paper towels, a pack of hot dogs, a pack of Oreos, a turtleneck for Mallory, a sippy cup and this super duper soft fleece pullover for G. I didn’t even have a buggy so the dust pan was literally hanging from my finger and I had stuff tucked under every part of me that would bend. You know exactly what I’m talking about!! Anyway… this fleece top was $5.00. This is why I love what I do! I can add a monogram to a $5.00 fleece top and I have a cute soft warm fleece for my G! The stitching is all light blue.
And now we come to my new best friend, the 9×9 HOOP!
http://www.allbrands.com/products/abp26773.html
This hoop is from Allbrands and if you have a 6 needle Brother machine, then this hoop is a must! It’s not made by Brother, but rather by Durkee and is compatible with several Brother and Babylock machines (see listing). This is a photo of the hoop on my machine. As you can see, my arm is expanded as wide as it’ll go just about ~ this hoop is probably as wide as the XL hoop that comes with the machine. It clips on just like any of the other hoops.

Here is a picture of the hoop hooped onto a size 4T turtleneck. It actually works great for smaller sizes too. I use medium cutaway and the 15″ x 25 yard roll from sewingmachine.com is great for this hoop!

Here is the 5×7 hoop on top as a comparison. The 9×9 hoop is about the same width b/c the 5×7 hoop is also 9″ wide. But, as you can see, it gives you more room vertically. Even though the 5×7 hoop is really 9″ wide, your machine will only allow you to use 7″ horizontally. With the 9×9 hoop, your machine recognizes it as the XL hoop so while you have to watch your boundaries like you do with Fast Frames, it gives you more than 7″ to work with across the shirt.
Here is a picture of my needle position as far up as it’ll go. The top of my design will be here and the needle will not hit the hoop.
Here is the finished shirt. I did not put a name on this shirt, but as you can see, there is plenty of room below the cross to put a name. Had I wanted a name on the shirt below the cross with a 5×7 hoop, I would have had to hoop vertically which would mean my shirt would be sideways on the machine! We all know this is a pain!
I was turned on to this hoop by some friends on Facebook, finally ordered it and use it all the time! As my friend HBS says, it’ll make your 5×7 hoop jealous!
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