Freestanding Lace Ellipse Table Runner Instructions

1. Hoop the water-soluble stabilizer. Depending on the type of stabilizer you are using, you have to hoop from a minimum of 2 and up to 4 layers. Make sure it is hooped very tight and stays that way throughout the whole process of stitching out.

2. Stitch out the free standing lace design components.
In order to prepare the table runner featured on our site, you will need to stitch 2 times all six embroidery designs, included in the set. Carefully cut off the loose thread ends you get in the process of stitching (at the beginning or when changing thread).

3. You will have noticed by now that each of the six embroidery designs in the set seems to consist of 2 parts, which are not attached to each other in any way. This is NOT a mistake. This is the way they should be stitched out and they should stay in this way.

There have been many questions how does one attach the freestanding edge to the fabric. Well, we guess the answer is clearly visible on these images. Each piece of the lace edge is designed so that it is stitched out in the same hoop with its adjacent piece of the inner part of the table runner. This is a very simple and yet very effective way our designer Stacy has found to make the correct placement and attaching of the lace edge to the runner as easy as it is only possible.

So, please when cutting away the excess stabilizer do NOT separate the 2 parts of each design. They MUST stay together on the water-soluble stabilizer as shown on the image to the right.

4. Connect the components to each other with manual stitches from the back side using the same thread you used to stitch out the designs. The places to apply the stitches are marked with red on the image but you will not make a mistake if you put a stitch or two in ALL places where two components touch each other.

When you are done connecting all pieces you should have something like this:

5. Place the connected freestanding lace components face up on top of the fabric. You can attach the lace to the fabric with pins or with temporary manual stitches. We prefer to use the second method as it usually is better at holding the lace and fabric together.

If the colors of the freestanding lace and the fabric you are using are very similar you may want to trace the outline of the freestanding lace with an invisible marking pen (like the one on the picture) in order to make the stitching easier. The ink from such a pen will disappear usually after 5-10 minutes when you place the material in water of after 24 hours. Although using such pens is considered absolutely safe, if you have not used it before, we would recommend that you test it with the thread / fabric you are going to use, just to be on the safe side.

6. Stitch the freestanding lace to the fabric using machine zigzag stitch – we used a 3 mm stitch with a density of 0.5 mm. Remember that you will have to do 3 passes in order to connect the freestanding lace to the fabric along the 3 perimeters which are clearly visible on the images.

When you are done stitching the freestanding lace and the fabric together:

7. Very carefully cut away the excess fabric from below the freestanding lace parts of the table runner. Please take it easy and make sure you do not cut the thread.

When you are done cutting away the fabric - dip the table runner in water until the stabilizer has been completely dissolved.