Sewing on thick fleece

[cbireley]

I have several jobs coming up that are on thick fleece headbands. Are there any tricks to keep the design from looking like it has "sunken" into the fleece? I have a "C" that is fill stitch with an outline. I've seen heavy fleece items, stitched, that has the fleece popping up around the stitching and it looks terrible. Just curious how you prevent that.

[Rod or Sharon]

Cindy,

One trick that has worked well for me is to create a complex fill the same shape as the design but slightly/barely larger. Open up the density to around the 50ish mark then duplicate this complex fill. Set the stitch direction on one of them to 45 degrees and 135 degrees on the other one. Change your entry and exit points so that they will sew continuous without stopping. This set of cross-hatch fills will be set in the project tree to be the very first elements to sew and will be the "same" color as the garment being sewn on.

This creates a kind of "fishnet" than knocks the fleece down and makes a nice base for the design to sit on top of.

Rod Springer
Amaya Tech & Trainer

[cbireley]

Thanks Rod. My problem is really that when I sew the C, the middle part, which is the fleece, puffs up and around the C, even with the density as loose as I can get it without it looking scarce. That probably doesn't make much sense, but the part of the fleece that pokes out bugs me. It's not the stitched area, it's the area around what is stitched. Is there a way to prevent this?

[Rod or Sharon]

Hi, this is Sharon, I have a few questions...how large is the "C", don't over stretch the fleece when hooping, use Solvy on top, be sure you use a good stabilizer on the bottom. And, lastly, as Rod said, use the technique we use with heavy fleece and lay it down with a fish net type fill BEFORE doing your embroidery on top--that includes the area where the embroidery is not...like an oval or circle area and embroidery on top of that. It actually looks sharp!
Sharon

[cbireley]

The C is about an inch tall...it's kinda like the Chicago C, oblong w/ a point in the middle. I do use solvy and heavy tear away stabalizer, 2 layers, normally. I'll see what I can do w/the "fish net type fill" and see how that goes for me...I have some time to play with it. Thanks!