Lets give Fun Projects a whirl and see what you think.
Fun Projects are just that – some kind of sewing (machine not needed) and minimal investment in materials for the basic project. You will then call upon your own creativity to embellish each project. It is okay to start out copying what you see and soon you will be trying something different – it may be as insignificant as making flowers blue instead of orange, or deciding you don’t like flowers for the project and use cute buttons. That is being creative!
Project #1 can be ready for Valentines Day. It is not one of my favorite holidays, but one of my favorite things is to take a basic shape, like a heart, and embellish it. Like a blank canvas, that is all it is until it has paint or some other medium on it. Then it becomes art. Ready to take your plain red felt heart and transform it into a piece of art?
Minimal Supplies
- Fabric Scissors
- Embroidery Needle
- Red Felt – enough to cut 2 heart shapes of the same size – no specific size is given
- White Embroidery Thread
Optional
- Sewing Machine
- Floral colors felt including green for leaves
- Ribbon, lace, buttons, beads, jewelry findings, seed beads
- Various colors of embroidery thread
- Fabric pieces for applique
- Tacky glue, Elmer glue, fabric glue
- Polyfill, confetti size cut left over felt, tissue paper, cotton balls, anything to softly fill heart
- Uncooked white rice to turn your heart into a hand warmer
- Flat glass stones
- Invisible thread for sewing on beads
- Fishing line to hang heart
Are you ready?
Step 1 –
Like in elementary school, fold the felt in half and freehand cut a half heart. It isn’t cheating if you have a heart pattern or template. I’m living on the wild side and doing it freehand.
Step – 2
Trace or hold cut heart on remaining felt and cut another the same size.
Step – 3
You will work with only one heart in this step. Using only the minimal supplies, you have many options to make a fun and decorative heart. I like to use 3 strands of embroidery thread on felt as it is thick enough to show up nicely.
As you can see, something as simple as X’s embroidered on the heart looks good. Simplicity and unplanned placement gives the work a primitive feel.
Step 4 –
Now is the time you design the second heart. I chose to keep a similar simplistic look. I did a straight embroidery stitch heart echoing the felt heart shape. I then did a running stitch in the right lobe for a hand quilted look. Alone, the amount of stitching was great, but I wanted to see what a simple white felt ruffled felt pair of flowers would look like in the adjacent lobe. Gold beads as centers in the flowers was a subtle bit of bling. I liked the addition.
Step 5 –
Time to sew the two hearts together and puff them with a little filler. I will use a small amount of polyfill and close the heart shape with a running stitch – sweet and simple. This was the look I was hoping for. How are you finishing? Maybe a blanket stitch? A ladder stitch? Glue?
Conclusion –
I hope you enjoyed this fun project enough to take it to the next level by letting it be the caytalist to a one of a kind creation. How cute would a simple bowl full of hearts on a side table look? Or personalized hearts with name or initials embroidered and maybe even a hobby or favorite animal embroidered on the other heart. Endless ideas!
Often when an idea pops into my head, I quickly sketch it and work from my sketch to an end product. That happened while working on putting this all together. I can’t wait to get it made, photographed and posted for you to see.