Sewing the Dream | Chapter 5 - Bits and Pieces

Every time I use the Brother Innov-is XV I discover something new, so for this blog, I thought I’d share some of the tips and tricks that I’ve picked up. I’d be delighted if any of you have any tips and tricks that you’d like to share too – let everyone know in the comments section below!

First off, let’s talk about the machine’s resizing capabilities. This was a bit of a revelation to me, as while I knew that you could resize a design on the machine to a limited extent, what I did not know was that by simply pressing a different icon (the one shown above) you can resize up or down much more! The Brother XV/Dream Machine is apparently the only machine on the market that can resize up or down by – wait for it – adding or deleting stitches! How cool is that?

Making a custom shape

The next thing I learnt I came across when messing around in the Design Centre, making some quilted oven gloves. I wanted to make a very simple, three-layer, shaped and quilted piece and I wanted to do it all on the XV/Dream Machine. 

I pondered my plan of action for a while and realised that all I had to do was select shapes from the Design Centre. One was a square that I quickly turned into a correctly sized rectangle and the second was a half-circle that I simply placed at the bottom of the rectangle. Of course, this left me with two lines across the middle of my new shape. No problem – I simply enlarged the image (you can enlarge by up to 800% on this machine) and simply rubbed out the lines using the eraser tool. Where I went slightly wrong and rubbed out more than I should have done, I simply filled in the missing gaps using the pencil icon. Easy!

Next, I made outlines in running stitch, saving them in Design Centre. I did this thrice using different colours, and each time saved them in Design Centre. My last step was to select the fill I wanted. This was easily and quickly done by selecting the crosshatch, diamond type quilting, adjusting it to the size and angle that I wanted and saving it in the Design Centre.

Finally opening the first outline I had saved, I took it through to embroidery. Then, using the add button, I added the next outline, the third outline, and finally the quilted design.

I hooped up polymesh stabiliser in my 9.5x9.5” hoop. I could probably have used 8x8 but I like to have a little bit of room to manoeuvre. I sewed the first outline, used it as a placement outline, laid down the towelling and sewed it in place. Next, I took the hoop off the machine, and importantly, turned it over and carefully trimmed away the polymesh inside the outline. Putting the hoop back in the machine, I laid down my Insulbrite, stitched it down and trimmed it close to the stitching (which would keep it out of the eventual seam line). Finally, I laid down the top fabric, and stitched the outline and the quilt fill. Job done!

All pieces made, all that remained was to trim the shapes, put them together and bind – using the splendid dual-feed foot on the sewing side that attached the binding nice and easily!

I also made this small bag by combining two rectangles of different sizes in Design Centre and putting different fills in them.

Then I made this bag by experimenting with shapes within the Design Centre – easy peasy!

Will my embroidery fit in its frame

I had a design in mind to use in a wooden oval frame. To check if it would fit, all I had to do was measure the wooden frame area, select one of the shapes in the Design Centre – a circle that I resized to an oval to match my required dimensions – then create a simple running stitch outline.

Next, I switched to embroidery, and using the Add button, added the design I wanted. This way, I could easily see whether my design would fit or not.

When sewing, I could either choose to sew the outline and use it as a guide when framing my finished piece or frame freehand.

Labelling your designs

The XV has such a large amount of memory that often, I stash designs on the machine for later use. When you save a design to the machine you can’t rename it as such, and when scrolling through the memory, one lavender heart or outline block looks pretty much like another. To solve this, using one of the built-in fonts, I typed in the size of the heart or name of the design – ‘6-inch lavender heart’ or ‘5x7 bag’, for example – before saving it to the memory. That means when I want to load it up and sew it, I can easily see the size, load it, then delete the text or numbers before sewing.

So, there you have it – a variety of things you can do with your XV that you may not have thought of. The possibilities are truly endless!

Angie Lawrence