Now I have made these type of appliques onesies before but I didn't sew around the edges of the fabric. I was very leery of it, like how will I be able to sew the edges of these tiny shirts by ulled the back of the shirt away. I just envisioned a struggle. Well, Kathy (new baby mommy) had her second baby boy and I really wanted to make these shirts to go with her nautical boy's room theme and the onesies that I made before turned out great and all but they really needed the finishing touch of the sewing around the edges. It will also help keep the applique attached in the wash as I am also skeptical of the fusible web product holding up in the wash. I have noticed that some survive the wash perfectly fine yet some do not. It may have something to do with getting good adhesion when applying the applique from the start. Maybe what you think is ironed on well, may not be the best. Is there a way of knowing? Anyhow, I am very pleased with the way these turned out. YES, I did come up with this on my own for the big brother and new little brother. I cannot wait until she sends me pictures of the boys in these, I will certainly update this post with updated pics!
How I Did It:
1. I sketched half an anchor on a folded piece of paper. I'm not too confident that I could actually draw an anchor where both sides matched. This is the best way that I could come up with.
2. I cut out the anchor. I did make them different sizes for the different size shirts.
3. I used my Generations embroidery software to design labels for my anchors. I used a simple arial font. I stitched them both out on my embroidery sewing machine.
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4. I pressed them both.
5. I used Steam A Seam to adhere the fabric appliques to the shirts. You should take a look at a better tutorial HERE. It has more pictures and more detail for each step in the process. Just remember that I did not sew the edges of those onesies!
a. I traced the anchors onto Steam A Seam fusible webbing sheets. I traced them on the side where the webbing is adhered to. (Note: the webbing is in the middle of two sheets of wax type paper and the webbing is adhered to one side rather than the other.) The side that the webbing sticks to is the side that you want to draw on and if your pattern is not symmetrical it will need to be reversed, make sure you do so here.
b. I placed the fabric right side down.
c. I peeled the opposite side of the Steam A Seam sheet paper (without the anchor design) away and placed the design over top of the fabric, centering the anchor over my embroidery.
d. I ironed the Steam A Seam to the back of the fabric. This is ensure that the design and/or fabric will not shift while it is cut out.
e. I cut the anchor out along the lines of the design.
f. I flipped the anchor over, peel the other sheet off of the webbing and ironed the anchor to the shirt.
6. I used the applique stitch and stitched around the anchors on each shirt. The hole at the top was quite tricky. I cannot be begin to tell you what the correct way of doing it would have been. I will just leave it at that. =)
