JANOME 500E PROJECT IDEA: AMETHYST ADVENTURES……AND A CONFESSION FROM A SEWAHOLIC!

This was a fun little table topper or mini wall hanging to make. I named it “Amethyst Adventures” for obvious reasons.  I wanted to use designs on the Janome MC500E to showcase just a couple of the great embroidery options available on this machine. I also wanted to put the ACUFIL QUILTING KIT for Janome 500E through its paces so all the quilting on this little project was done using the Acufil (magnetic clamp) hoop in this Kit.  The Acufil Quilting Kit for 500E is available as an optional accessory for this embroidery machine. (this kit is compatible with Janome MC400E; MC450E and MC500E)

You will notice in the pic above that there are over 100 designs built into the software (called Acufil Tool) which comes with this Acufil Kit. I used some of these designs for my Amethyst Adventures table topper. Of course, I could have brought other quilting designs (from CD’s I may own or other quilting designs I may have purchased or digitized) into the software and used those instead. There are SEW many options with this wonderfil Acufil QUILTING-IN-THE-HOOP option that Janome offers for many of our Janome embroidery machines.  The Acufil hoop ASQ22 comes standard with our top of the Line MC15000 Embroidery machine – a more than CAD $500 value included right there! Acufil Quilting kits are available as optional accessory kits for the following Janome embroidery machine models: Janome MC11000/ Special Edition and MC12000. And also the MC500E as per this post.

Acufil Quilting kit for Janome MC12000

Not only are there over 100 quilting designs included in this kit, but there is the Acufil Quilting hoop – the ASQ18 b hoop which is a 7.2 inches square (or 184mm square).  In the kit box are 8 large magnetic clamps and the hard plastic template – essential for the hooping of the quilt for quilting on the embroidery machine.  See pics below. It is a very slick and fabulous system. In all honesty, Acufil quilting is one of my very favourite features on our Janome embroidery machines. I absolutely love the fact that the quilting is so even and beautiful AND that the labour intensive and “heavy” work involved in wrangling a quilt for free motion quilting or quilting with a walking foot is simply not part of the equation when the embroidery machine does it for us. Acufil makes my machine quilting SO much easier ……..and it can do the same for you too!

The 3 embroidered blocks were pieced using the Square in a Square technique  and then joined together with the other 3 blocks with sashing and a border to look like they are all floating. Notice the decorative stitching around the lilac block.

I could not help myself…….Confessions of a Sewaholic: I struggle to resist the temptation to embellish with decorative stitches! I used a pretty matching variegated thread and a different decorative stitch for each block. I stitched this on our Janome Horizon MC9400 which has 350 glorious stitches to choose from………which is why I could not resist the temptation?!

Then came another fun part: deciding what acufil quilting I would use to fill in all the batik fabric around the lilac blocks. I auditioned various designs in the Acufil Tool software and then saved them to the USB to open at the Janome 500E. I also printed paper templates of the designs so that I could use these to position and mark the fabric before hooping with the ASQ18b hoop.

A stippling design was selected for this center section of the mini quilt.

Confessions of a Sewaholic: notice part of the quilting came onto the lilac fabric?  In an ideal world the placement of my quilting-in-the-hoop or the thread colour might have been different. But, hey, I was having so much fun!

Finally, the binding in the same batik fabric was added using the Janome Quilt Binder set. 

Is that not a close to perfect mitred corner using the Janome Quilt Binder set – even if I say so myself?! Stitched in place with a feather stitch and variegated thread.