How to personalize Christmas stockings using machine embroidery

It’s already the last day! The week just seemed to fly by, and I’ve barely scratched the surface of the things I wanted to personalize, the techniques I wanted to share with you, and the fantastic features of the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80.

Yesterday I created the beautiful flower by couching it to fabric using couching feet, mySewnet ecosystem and the Designer Majestic Hoop, I see this displayed on a cushion cover. See the many tips to help you accomplish this yarn couching embroidery technique.

Yarn Couching embroidery design

Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80 with the embroidery unit

Remember our Christmas Wish List? It’s getting long, and we’ll need a big stocking to hold all our goodies. Today, we’re personalizing a Christmas stocking, and I’ve found the perfect one. It’s BIG!

There are a couple of options for making your Christmas stocking. If you’ve decided to make your Christmas Stocking from scratch, then I would suggest that your name be embroidered onto the material for the cuff before you cut it out.

When you cut the cuff, it’ll be easy to center it from left to right and top to bottom. Here’s an example of a stocking I made with a font from the PREMIER +2 software system. It’s not quite centered, but I can live with it.

A personalized Christmas stocking

If you’re personalizing a ready-made stocking or make the stocking first and then personalize it, here are a couple of tips.

1. It will be a challenge to get inside to stitch the name in place. Depending on the size of the opening, a metal hoop will be very helpful. Remember, the metal hoop comes in 3 sizes.
2. The second thing is to make sure you get the orientation correct. When you flip that cuff up, make sure to orient it in the metal hoop correctly, or the name could end up inside the cuff, backward or upside down. I suggest taking a piece of paper with the name written on it. Pin it to the cuff before you unfold the cuff. Then when you’re trying to line up the lettering, you know precisely which orientation the lettering has to be to appear correctly on the cuff.

It would be a challenge to embroider inside this cuff after the stocking is made.

The third way to make a Christmas stocking is to find a Christmas stocking panel you like. I found a large, modern colored stocking panel that is perfect. There’s a sizeable dark teal area that is perfect for some embroidery.

The panel contains a front and a back to the stocking, so the first thing to determine is which way we want the stocking to face, or you may decide that you like one side more than the other.

A Christmas stocking panel in teal and cream

The first thing I did was iron on a piece of Inspira Fuse N’Tear stabilizer to the wrong side of the stocking, where I’ll do the embroidery. Make sure to use a moderately hot iron to press that stabilizer on. It needs to adhere well to the project, as it’ll prevent the cotton from distortion during the hooping and embroidery processes.

Cut the Fuse N’Tear large enough so that the stabilizer and the fabric both catch between the inner and outer parts of the hoop.

The Fuse N’ Tear Stabilizer on the back of the Christmas stocking panel

Did you know that the same parent company owns Singer and Husqvarna Viking? Singer has released some new products which are perfect to add to your Christmas List.

Singer has released an Ironing and Crafting Station that you’re going to want. Thank goodness, that stocking is big! Look at the size of that surface, and did you notice the shape of the board? The surface is wide enough that you can easily press the width of quilting cotton from selvage to selvage with room to spare. Now that’s a great idea!

The design of the legs makes it very sturdy so much less likely that your iron will fall off. It includes a drawer for rulers or small cutting mats. There’s a stand for the iron, and that silver cover comes with a 1″ grid printed on it. I LOVE this ironing board. Whether I’m pressing small pieces, yardage, or quilt backs, it’s a snap to get the job done quickly and efficiently.

The Singer Ironing and Crafting Station

If a new ironing station is on your list, then why not add a new iron as well. Singer has just released this sleek looking iron in some pretty modern colors. It’s called the SteamLogic Plus Steam Iron.

It’s got all the features that I love about an iron – a long cord on a swivel base, a big water reservoir for lots of steam, and a 30-minute Auto-Off.

As a quilter, I use steam all the time for my quilting projects. You can never have too much steam.

SINGER® SteamLogic Plus Steam Iron

After the stabilizer is pressed to the wrong side of the fabric, it’s time to hoop the stabilizer and the fabric. I used the 360 x 200mm hoop as the stocking is huge!

I could have marked a chalk line to help with the hooping process, but I didn’t, and it appears to be pretty straight. I’ll use the Design Positioning, and Corner Check features to position the embroidery exactly where I want it to be.

These two features make the hooping process so much easier. If I’m not perfect in my hooping process, I can adjust the design on the screen to match the placement of the fabric in the hoop.

A teal-colored Christmas stocking panel in the Husqvarna Viking DESIGNER Royal Hoop

I used the Clarendon 30mm font from the builtin embroidery fonts. As you can see, the lettering is too long to go sideways. Besides, the lettering doesn’t match the orientation of my hooped Christmas stocking. I can easily rotate the lettering with the embroidery edit tools.

Do you remember when we had to do all this manipulation in software and then bring the design onto the stitch out screen? It’s so easy these days!

Not only is there a rotation tool on the embroidery edit, but there’s a Scale tool to make the design larger or smaller (up to 20%), and there’s a Position tool so I can move the design on the screen.

Lettering on the Embroidery Edit Screen of the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80

It was easy enough to rotate the design, and it fits into the 360 x 200mm hoop. But I’m not ready to move into Embroidery Stitch out yet.

Lettering on the Embroidery Edit Screen of the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80

It might be difficult for you to see in this photo, but the orientation of the name isn’t right. If I were to stitch out the name as it appears on the screen, it would be upside down on the stocking. That would not be good.

It’s a good idea to look at the machine from a distance, as you can see in the photo. Look at the way the design is oriented on the screen. Then look at the orientation of your fabric. If they don’t match up, now is the time to change things around. I could have unhooped the fabric and turned the stocking around, but why do that when I can simply rotate that design by 180 degrees and get it lined up in the correct orientation.

The lettering on the screen does not match the orientation of the hooped stocking

The writing is now in the correct orientation to match the stocking. But I’m still not quite ready to stitch the design out yet.

Lettering on the Embroidery Edit Screen of the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80

I used the Design Positioning feature to assist with centering the lettering in that dark teal space. There are two anchor points for Design Positioning, and I used both. I could have used chalk lines to mark the horizontal and vertical centers on the stocking. Instead, I used the Corner Check and a small ruler to ensure the lettering was centered. That was super easy to use.  I find that if you manually drop the needle during this process, you can get the lettering exactly where you want. And if you forget to raise the needle? The Designer Brilliance 80 will give you a notification that you need to raise the needle. No damaging your needle or your fabric!

A small ruler inside an embroidery hoop of the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80

The Design Positioning tool is so helpful. If you don’t know how to use it, you need to get out the manual – WAIT – use the built-in tools right on the screen to learn how to use Design Positioning. Keep in mind that Design Positioning in the Embroidery Stitch Out screen, not the Embroidery Edit screen.

I can zoom right into the design to ensure that my anchor points are where I want them to be. Not only can I get my anchor points very precise with the Zoom feature, but I can ensure that my design placement relative to another design on the screen is very accurate. All done with a few buttons right on the screen. It couldn’t be easier!

Now that I’m happy with the placement, I’m ready to hit start.

Using the Zoom features for a closer look at the placement of the anchor points in Design Positioning

Here’s another tip for getting this design just right. I don’t want any puckering around that lettering. In addition to the Fuse N’Tear stabilizer, I’ll slip a second layer of stabilizer, this time the Inspira Tear-A-Way stabilizer beneath the embroidery hoop before I hit start.

A piece of Inspira Tear-A-Way stabilizer sitting in an embroidery hoop

Another tip: make sure you have the desired color of thread threaded on the machine. I hit start and then realized that I hadn’t changed threads from my previous project. Yikes – I was able to stop it before it started to do any of the stitching. Perhaps, it’s a good idea to thread the machine first before you start with any editing!

Once you get the editing done, you’re so excited to start stitching that you forget to change the thread. At least that’s what happened to me!

The embroidery is stitched out in the Designer Royal Hoop on the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80

There you have it – the stocking panel now has a name stitched on it, and it’s ready for assembly. The instructions call for you to cut out the two sides and sew them together. That’s way too wimpy for me. I’ll add some fusible fleece and quilt the two side panels with a grid pattern and then add a lining. If you’re going to do something, I say, do it right!

Look how classy this looks!

Embroidered name Madeline on Christmas fabric using the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80 sewing and embroidery machine.

Embroidered name Madeline on Christmas fabric using the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80 sewing and embroidery machine.

It’s so easy to do things right when you’re working with incredible tools, like the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80 sewing and embroidery machine.

That draws to a close the week using the Husqvarna Viking Designer Brilliance 80 sewing and embroidery machine. Hopefully, you got some great ideas for personalizing gifts for yourself, your family and friends, or your house. Whether you embroider ready-made items or items that you make from scratch, the possibilities are endless. Don’t forget that you can personalize with a name, initials, or some image/design that is near and dear to the heart of the recipient. Now, where do I start?

Before I close out this week, I wanted to recap that fantastic list of items that we put on our Christmas wish list. Check them out and make sure that you add one, or two, or three – well, you decide. You may need a Christmas stocking as large as mine!

1. Designer Brilliance 80 sewing and embroidery machine
2. PREMIER + 2 software in three different levels
3. DESIGNER Majestic Hoop and the Metal hoop, which comes in three sizes.
4. Extra Magnets for the Metal hoop
5. Consumables like Inspira stabilizers, thread, pre-wound bobbins.
6. Singer Ironing and Crafting Station
7. Singer SteamLogic Plus Steam Iron
8. Let’s not forget the many different accessory feet you can purchase as well, like the Yarn Couching Feet Set.

There are so many great ideas. I’d suggest that you take a look at the Accessory Catalog which you can access online, and start assembling that list.

Thanks for following along this week.

Have a great day!

Ciao!!!

This is part 5 of 5 in this series

Go back to part 4: What to know about couching work on the Designer Brilliance 80

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