Save Time! --->Make Pattern Templates

Gosh, I haven’t  posted for a few weeks … it feels good to be back!

Summertime is always busy for me with outdoor things but I’m still stitching in between cutting grass and weeding the vegetable garden.

Today, I want to talk about templates and how I use them.

My last pattern, “Apple Blossoms” has a lot of little leaves in the design.  

I know how much time it takes to trace out all those leaves onto freezer paper, so to save customers the time, I drew out each one of the 50 some leaves onto a sheet of paper.  Then, all you have to do is put that leaf pattern sheet into your copier and copy it onto an 8 1/2” x 11” sheet of freezer paper.  So much time is saved.

But, what if you don’t have a copier?  That’s when we need to use templates to help.

Here’s a littel sneak peak at my newest design …

That’s actually a real Clematis flower on there.  Before I started stitching this, I picked a few of the flowers and laid them out just to get a better idea of placement.  but anyway…

This new design will have a lot of leaves on it so I’ll show you how I made my leaf template.

I drew one leaf onto freezer paper and rough cut around it. 

I used a glue stick on the back of the freezer paper leaf…

Then I glued it onto some plastic.  Here, I’m using a sheet of plastic x-ray film but any type of flat plastic will work.  I used to use the plastic Cool-Whip lids.  Cardboard or cardstock would work too but it’s difficult to cut the shape exactly and it doesn’t hold up to a lot of use.

Now just cut around the drawn leaf line and there’s your leaf template!  The freezer paper will stay on the plastic if it’s been glued well.  Take a few seconds to label  it so that you’ll know that it’s the leaf for the Clematis and not the leaf for say,the Apple Blossoms.

 

The plastic template makes it so easy to trace around, giving you the perfect shape each time.

 

Watch for my new “Climbing Clematis” tablerunner design …coming soon!