Making the most of decorative stitches for making applique mittens

Yesterday, I showed you how to prepare templates and fabric for the mitten wall quilt or table topper. Today, we’ll be adding some decorative stitching.

There are over 100 decorative stitches on the Brother NQ700 machine and most of them can be made wider and/or longer to create even more stitches! Once you choose a stitch, you just press the + or – key to adjust the settings.

I used Sulky threads in variegated colors on my first piece of red fabric for the main part of the mitten.

Decorative stitches for the main part of the mitten

Trace around the template, using a removable fabric marker and lining up the decorative stitching as desired.

Trace around the template.

Remove the excess tear-away stabilizer from the back. A small amount of the fusible web will show. This helps to stabilize the fabric when it’s placed on the background square.

Remove excess stabilizer from the back.

Cut out mittens on the drawn lines.

Using the plastic templates for the cuff and top of the mitten, trace the shapes on the paper side of the fusible web. Trace 1 shape and 1 reversed shape for each mitten.

Cut out the shapes leaving about ¼” all around. Press the shapes onto the blue fabric. Cut out the shapes on the drawn lines. Remove the paper backing from the fusible web. Set the pieces aside until all the mittens are completed.

Fabric shapes for the first pair of mittens

For my next pair of mittens, I decided to use some decorative ribbon. Again, using the open-toe foot that comes with the Brother NQ700 machine, I stitched a simple zigzag stitch down the center of the ribbon. Then I sewed it to my red mitten fabric with a straight stitch along the edges.

Sewing a decorative stitch on ribbon

Finished ribbons

I finished the rest of the fabric with more of the many decorative stitches on the Brother NQ700 machine. I love the way the decorative stitches are all shown on the cover of the machine as well as in the manual that comes with the machine!

Decorative stitches on the machine cover

Decorative stitches are also shown in the manual.

Cut out the mitten shapes the same way you did for the first pair of mittens.

Here’s my second pair of mittens already to place on the background fabric.

Another pair of mittens with decorative stitching

Join me again tomorrow when I’ll show you how to use a twin needle with the double spool stand on the Brother NQ700 machine to create more decorative stitches for your mitten wall quilt.

This is part 3 of 5 in this series

Go back to part 2: The very best way to prepare your template from a quilt pattern

Go to part 4: In quilting, using a twin needle IS double the fun [tutorial]

Print this page or save as a PDF