First up was to draw a picture. She does this all the time for me (you should see my fridge…I need more magnets) She chose to draw a fish.

A simple felt tip pen fish on paper.

Next up was to take a photo of the drawing to get it into the iPad – easy as click.

Now open up Janome AcuSketch App and import the photo if taken with iPad camera OR  simply open AcuSketch app and take a pic IN the app using the little camera icon. The fish drawing then appears on the AcuSketch app screen:

Next up: sketch in the APP: no problem for our 8 year old…..she just used our lovely Janome stylus pen to trace around her fish in exactly the same way she had just drawn it with a felt tip pen. Of course, she could also have drawn it directly onto the App screen without doing the felt tip pen drawing.

Next up: turn the sketch into stitches. There is a choice of FOUR different types of stitches: single straight stitching as in the FREE APP or use stem, zig-zag or triple straight stitching if you have purchased the IN APP additional stitches. Our 8 year old chose stem stitch.

Embroidery done – INSTANTLY  digitized by touching one screen icon.

Now we are ready for the embroidery machine……… we need to first send this fish to the embroidery machine. Please note that ACUSKETCH APP may be used by ANY Janome embroidery machine owner…..you do not have to have one of our WIFI capable models. CAN be used with the Janome MC500E for instance. So AcuSketch APP is NOT limited to the Janome MC15000 and the Skyline S9.

Good to know, right? All you need do is email the design to yourself and then save it onto a USB stick at your computer to pop into your embroidery machine to stitch. Sure….it is easier to just send a design wirelessly out of the iPad to the Janome Mc15000 or Skyline S9  BUT AcuSketch APP CAN be used for our other embroidery machines too. Bonus!

There our fish magically “sailed through the air” to our Janome MC15000!

Embroidery all done……you should have seen her little face at this point…….So pleased to see her drawing now stitched in front of her eyes!

Next up was cutting the backing fabric for the little pillow. Nanna did this as she is still a little nervous to let her little one use her rotary cutter. I have nasty visions of a severed finger tip and what I might then have to say to my daughter – imagine the horror scenario?!

Do you have any advice on teaching little ones how to safely use a rotary cutter? Or is 8 years still a little early?

She is such a sport – she had never used a serger before but Nanna coached a little again and she was off and running …….or perhaps it is just that the Janome AT2000D is so easy to use – even an 8 year old can do it!! And she was fascinated by the air threading. Both her and her sister said “ SO cool!”

Front & back serged together …….so easy and we had lots of smiles on her sweet little face.

Next up was snipping the serger tails. TIP: our little leftie was struggling so with Nanna’s right-hand scissors so I bought her a pair of these lovely soft handle scissors (Karen Kay Buckley brand) and they mould to her left hand – bingo! Thank you Cindy of Cindy’s Threadworks for these scissors – you were right. They worked for our little leftie.

Turning the pillow out to the right side and using a chopstick to poke the corners. Next was to raid Nanna’s stash of pillow stuffing and sew the hole closed.

She was so proud of her achievement! High tech App and embroidery? No sweat for a kid who knew exactly where to find pics of Daddy on Mummy’s cell phone when she was just 18 months old………this technology is all a walk in the park for her!  And it really is not that hard for us more mature, possibly not so tech savvy people either!

Have you introduced a special young person to the joys of sewing?

Have you had the joy of watching creativity blossom and grow in a little loved one?

I have – and it feels so very good.