Our First Smocking Project - Part 1

Last night Victoria and I decided to get out our new smocking pleater and pleat some fabric to do smocking on. It was quite an adventure! first you have to cut out the piece of material, roll it on a dowel (nice and tight) and then start feeding it through the pleater. The needles poke through the fabric every 1/2 inch which creates the pleating. Then we began to embroider our design over the pleats (which is what smocking is). The nice thing about smocking is that you can use what ever embroidery pattern you want for anything you want to make (you can even make up you own design!) Well, we found a design we wanted from an amazing magazine call "Sew Beautiful". Here is the link to their website. www.sewbeautifulmag.com

On this project we will walk you step by step on our smocking design! Hope you enjoy!!!

Above is a close up of us pleating the material. You use 10 spools of thread (one color for every needle) It helps to have two people, so you don't knot the threads and it stay nice and neat!

This picture (above) is the cable stitch. This is the most basic, most commonly used stitch in smocking. The look of the cable depends on whether your thread is above or below your needle. (don't understand it? it may be a little confusing but if you want you can always ask for help!)
The stitch that creates the "v's" is called the trellis. You use the same concept as the cable stitch but you gradually walk up the pleats, then back down.
Here's what we have so far. I'll post more pictures as we progress.