Two of my college daughters adore monogramming everything. Can you tell that these northern women are attending a southern college? Those southern girls have influenced them and for the good. Well, they do get teased about that southern drawl that creeps in when they first come home, but that accent does not last long.

Thankfully, one of them loves machine embroidery too and usually monograms her own, as well as her sister’s garments. As to be expected, mother and daughter have different techniques when it comes to embroidering, but we do compliment each other. Things she does not like to do, I love, and vice versa. She usually does my trimming, especially on applique (love those young eyes) and I usually do any precision placement.

This time the girls wanted to replicate an appliqued monogram and its placement on a t-shirt, but in different colors. Normally, I would have kept notes as to where I placed it on the t-shirt, but my daughter had done it and documenting is not in her vocabulary. Sure we could have just put the t-shirt on and re-measured it, but there was so much discussion as to whether it would be exactly in the same spot, so mom to the rescue.

The trusty light box came in handy in lining up the two t-shirts. The monogrammed shirt was placed on the bottom and the other shirt on top, and then I found the center of the design by using the centering ruler by Designs in Machine Embroidery. It comes in an Embroidery Tool Kit several other great measuring devices (no this is no paid endorsement). Once the center was found, it was all down hill from there. I put on my trusty snowman-centering sticker and then my daughter was able to center the design on the embroidery machine. The t-shirt crisis was saved with a light box.

The original t-shirt and another larger version on the back of the t-shirt

How have you replicated a machine embroidery design for which you had not kept notes?