Current Mood : Elation !
Spent on Barbie stuff : $8.64
Fun, busy day. For starters, our tutor officially quit on us, saying she just didn't think she had the energy to do a good job. Too bad she waited until past the last minute to tell us this. So, I guess I'm the summer tutor. Starting tomorrow. This oughta be good...
Took Dearest Son to Dollar Tree, mostly to get out of the house. He likes to have stress balls now, so I wanted to make sure he had several. I wasn't expecting to find much, but ...hmm. Cards that go to that Barbie ‘I-Design' toy. Looked over one package, since the ‘I-Design' setup had been listed as the 21st century's "Fashion Plates", and it did sound cute. So I went through the pegs and got one of each of the eight different sets they had.
It's actually quite fun. You can play with just the cards, the shuffler thingie and the scanner device aren't necessary. Basically, you get 15 cards in each themed set. There's three models - Barbie, Teresa, and Raquelle - three backdrops, and nine transparent ‘fashion' cards. You can mix and match the clothes and the characters, and store your favorite in the included pink plastic frame. Some of the clothes are familiar, if you've been anywhere near the Fashion Fever or playline aisles in the last year or two. Of course, the more cards you have, the more versatile or just plain wild the choices get, so, like Pokemon, the idea is that you gotta get ‘em all.
Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to have caught on as well as Mattel would have liked, since I found the whole series at Dollar Tree. Heck, the little stand-up frames - transparent pink plastic with the current ‘Barbie' silhouette in the upper left corner - are worth the buck. I'll probably spray-paint a few, since they're all pink. On those days when I just don't have a photo ready, don't be surprised if you see an ‘I-design' image instead !
And in the evening, everyone was busy with their own stuff, so I decided not to let ‘Sew FSL' carry over to June on the ‘Schedule of Machine Embroidery Efforts' list. Read a few more pages, and discovered that as many pages say to use the same thread, top and bobbin as say keep bobbin thread in the bobbin, unless you want your design to be the same on both sides', so I decided to load up some Madeira, leave the bobbin thread where it was, and hoop up some water soluble stabilizer (WSS). And try Free Standing Lace, one more time.
First time I tried FSL, Brody'd barely been out of the box for a week. I'd bought Ultimate Solvy and Regular Solvy, both well-known WSS brands. The Ultimate touted itself as being four times as thick as the regular lightweight stuff. But to be honest, it was like hooping thin vinyl. And my not-yet-changed needle just punched right through it, but the regular ole Dual Duty thread wouldn't stay in the stabilizer - it popped right back out. Nothing I did - adding tulle or doubling the UltraSolvy - worked. So I put it all aside, thinking I'd figure it out later.
And today was later. This time, I used embroidery thread up top, bobbin in the, well, bobbin, and broke out the lightweight Solvy. Two sheets. Away we go. We'd gotten nearly to the end when...drat it all. The Solvy began to tear, and stitches were starting to pull out and tangle. Stopped Brody, and pulled out the mess. The Solvy washed away easily, like magic, but the design was a mess. I figured I could salvage it, so I let it dry and rolled up my sleeves. Round #2 - Fight !
Folded over a sheet of the just-used Solvy, so it was doubled, then added another new sheet. Triple thick ! And while Brody was resting, I went ahead and loaded up that bobbin I made from that three-ended spool of Madeira. Since both threads were matched in weight, and were fairly close in color, I thought the second might go better. It did. It did start to tear just as the final round of satin stitching got halfway through, but it held together long enough to complete the design. Yes ! I have successfully finished an FSL design - and I learned a lot !
Washed and dried the second version next to the first. I can really tell the difference. The WSS left both starched stiff, but the first one is much more fragile, mostly due to the thin, fine bobbin threads. Second is not only stronger, but bigger, and it can support itself much better. And I can now use any of the many, many FSL designs I've hoarded over the last few months !
I'm thinking of challenging myself to towels next week...
