Sew A Softie Tutorial for Valentine's Day - Puppy Love

Things are moving a darn sight too quickly for me this year... today marks the 2 month count down to our moving date! I have so much to do, but I couldn't miss out on taking part in the Sew A Softie Tutorials round up for Valentine's Day. (Catch up with our other tutorials here)

I've always struggled to come up with handmade Valentine's gifts/creations, but this one came to me while I was walking the dog, so I've entitled it 'Puppy Love'

You will need:

2 pieces of red felt 10cm x 10cm

1 piece of pale pink felt 10cm x 10cm

1 piece of pink felt 10cm x 10cm

Scraps of black & white felt

Pink embroidery thread

Black embroidery thread

Red embroidery thread

Glue

A good handful of stuffing

Tweezers

Instructions:

1. Use all the pattern pieces to cut out 2 red felt hearts, 2 pale pink ears, 2 pink ears, 2 white eye pieces, 2 black eye pieces and 1 black nose piece. Take 1 pale pink ear and 1 pink ear and whip stitch them together. Do the same with the other ear - I reversed the colours, so the ears were not the same both sides, but you don't have to.

2. Turn the ear inside out - I used a pencil to poke the bottom of the ear up inside of itself and then used a pair of tweezers to pull it out of the top. If you are getting children to sew this pattern, you can skip this step and leave the ears right side out.

3.  Glue the whites of the eyes onto one of the red hearts.

4. Glue the black part of the eyes onto the whites. I used the tweezers again to get them in the right position. With younger children it might be easier to draw the blacks of the eyes on with a felt pen.

5. Glue on the black nose and using a pencil or pen, draw on the mouth.

6. Using your black thread, back stitch the mouth onto the face.

7. Pin both red hearts together with the ears sandwiched in between. Then using the red thread, back stitch round, following the picture above. Leave an opening for the stuffing.

8. Stuff the face, making sure it is full, but not over stuffed. Then back stitch up the opening and you have a finished Puppy friend!

I hope you've enjoyed making this along with me and keep a look out for the rest of our Sew a Softie Valentine's series. 

Christmas Craft Tutorial - How to Make a Robin Softie

Gulp. It's been a while.

I didn't mean to take such a long break from blogging, but as with all of us, sometimes life just gets in the way.

But now, I'm baaaaaaack! (Don't groan - I have exceptionally good hearing you know!)

So, I'm posting this as part of another brainchild by Trixi Symonds of Coloured Buttons the fab idea - Sew a Softie for Christmas. There'll be a host of wonderful bloggers taking part and I'll have another post written up later with all their details.

The idea is that each tutorial is something that you can make at home, preferably simple enough to make with your children.

Here is my offering - A Christmas Felt Robin Softie:

I love these little guys and after doing my trial run, I had a go at making one with Seren, my 8 year old. She was off sick last week, which gave us the ideal time to sit down, without any interruptions and get going.

Seren decided she was fine with everything except the sewing machine as it was a bit fiddly. Although that stage could be done by hand, which she would have managed fine. (Her's is the one with purple legs on the left of the picture above)

You will need:

1 piece of mid brown felt 20cm x 20cm
1 piece of dark brown felt 10cm x 10cm
1 piece of red felt 10cm x 10cm
1 pipe cleaner (any colour you like)
2 small black brads
Toy stuffing
Thread to match your felt
Sewing machine (optional)
Pattern pieces which are at the end of this tutorial

Instructions:

1. Draw around the large pattern piece onto your mid brown felt with a biro (a pencil probably won't show up on the brown felt) You can pin the pattern to the felt, but little hands found it hard to keep the pattern piece in place as it was too large.

2. Turn the felt shape you have cut out over, so that any pen lines showing will be on the inside of the robin,

3. Cut out the red breast and stitch it to the brown felt as shown in the picture. Use 2 strands of red thread to match your felt and back stitch in place.

4. Cut out the small diamond shape from the dark brown felt. Fold it in half and attach just above the red breast with a couple of straight stitches at the top of the beak. 

5. Mark with your pen where you want the two eyes to be and then push each brad through in turn, opening them carefully at the back, so they lay flat against the felt.

6. Starting with one side of the 'face' part, place the rights sides of the felt together and stitch all the way along the curved edge. You can either do this on a sewing machine or using back stitch if sewing by hand.

7. Repeat for the other side of the 'face' and along one other curved side, leaving one side completely open.

8. Turn your robin the right side out, stuff him full of toy stuffing and then ladder stitch the opening closed. If you aren't sure how to do ladder stitch, I have a video tutorial on my You Tube channel.

9. Time to add the wings. Each wing is 2 layers of dark brown felt, whip stitched together and then whip stitched to the sides of the robin. I've angled mine in the picture above, but in the first pic, the trio of robins, they're all on straight with the wing tips pointing down. You can choose whichever feels right to you. Try and line them up so they're both at the same height and angle though.

Lastly you need to add the legs. I've used a single pipe cleaner and folded each end into a W shape for the claws at the end of the robins legs. I've then just stitched the pipe cleaner in place under the robin, so you can swivel his legs to be underneath him, or sticking out like mine are so he's sitting down. You'll see from the top pic that some of the pipe cleaners are longer than others so some have much longer legs - you can always cut down your pipe cleaner if you feel it's too long.

And you've done it - you have made your own Christmas Robin Softie! Well done!

I hope you've enjoyed making yours and I'd love to see any pictures of your creations from my patterns.

If you want to email me a pic, please do so at simmi@gracesfavours.co.uk

Happy Sewing!

PS. Here are the pattern pieces:

How to Make a Willy Wonka Golden Ticket Costume for World Book Day

Who loves Charlie & The Chocolate Factory?

Who knew that this year is the centenary of Road Dahl?

He was born on September 13 1916 and so to mark his 100th Birthday I've created this Charlie & The Chocolate Factory dressing up costume!

AHA! I hear you exclaim. She promised to show us this back in FEBRUARY when the costume was originally made for Patrick (Aged 5) to wear to school and it's taken till August to get round to posting it - I know and I'm sorry! My bad.

So here's the finished costume on a VERY excited Patrick:

You Will Need:

Large rectangle of thick felt - size according to the person you are making the costume for.
Large rectangle of gold felt (same size as thick felt)
Large piece of gold material (at least 2" larger than thick felt)
Black felt for lettering
Iron on fusible interfacing (bondaweb or similar)
4 pieces of elastic for shoulder & waist straps
muslin cloth or cotton cloth for ironing
Sewing Machine
Fabric pen or tailor's chalk
Lots and lots and lots more pins!


How To:

1. Iron the fusible interfacing onto black felt, trace around the letters (the wrong way round) and cut out. Then iron the black felt letters onto the gold material according to the bondaweb instructions. For mine, it's simply, peel off the paper backing and iron on a hot setting with steam for 10 - 15 seconds on each piece. Make sure you use a cotton muslin or cloth on top of the felt & gold material as you don't want to cause iron marks on the shiny material.

2. If you have a really large piece of gold material then you can cut it into a rectangle after the letters are ironed in place. But if you have a piece of material already cut to size, make sure you center the letters on it. I held the gold material up against Patrick to make sure it wasn't too big/too small.

3. Take a large piece of thick felt and cut it to a rectangle 2 inches smaller than the gold material.

4. Pin the gold material onto the felt rectangle and tuck the excess behind the felt. Pin all the way round.

5. Realise that you needed to center your words to the middle of the rectangle... unpin and re-position. Then repin! D'oh!

6. Tack the gold fabric into place using a needle and long stitches. You will be removing these tacking stitches later, so make them large so they're easier to remove.

7. Cut a piece of gold felt to the same size and pin this onto the back of your gold material & thick felt piece. You now have 3 layers.

8. Machine stitch the 3 layers together, with the 4 pieces of elastic slipped in between the layers - 2 at the shoulders and two for the waist. To work out where these should go, hold the 'ticket' up to your wearer and mark with a fabric pen or chalk onto the gold felt.

9. Cut another piece of the thick felt and another slightly larger piece of the gold felt. Pin the gold felt in place over the thick felt, with the edges tucked under at the back. Machine stitch these together.

10. Finally, line up the front and back piece of the ticket (on against your wearer if you have another pair of hands to help you, or you can lay them down flat on the table/clean floor!) and pin the 4 pieces of elastic into place on the back piece of the ticket. Stitch these on by hand, making sure you go over them a couple of times or by machine, but the whole costume might be a bit unwieldy by then to manage on the machine.

And Ta-Daaaa! You have a Willy Wonka Golden Ticket Costume and hopefully a very happy little (or big!) wearer!

I'd love to see any pictures you take from making this costume - or any of our other patterns!

Visit our Tutorials page for more ideas and makes.

How To: Felt Weaving - Rainbow Drinks Coaster Tutorial

Happy Summer Holidays!

We're currently enjoying a couple of weeks staying with the grandparents in Ireland, so beaches, lots of being spoiled by Nanny and board games contests are predicted in our futures!

While we're here, I wanted to share a tutorial with you for the 'Thank You' gifts the kids made for their teachers this year - Rainbow Felt Woven Coasters.

This is a great craft for kids of all ages and abilities as you can tailor the challenge to suit their capabilities. As we were short on time (having, as always, left the present making till the last week of term!) I did most of the hard work prep and the kids did the assembly.

You Will Need:

A square paper template (about 5" x 5")

1 piece of felt for the base

5 strips of coloured felts (about 0.75" wide and twice as long as as the square)

glue

A heavy book.

Instructions:

1. Using a sharp pair of scissors, cut 6 straight lines from top to bottom in your base piece of felt, starting 0.75" down from the top and stopping 0.75" from the bottom. Starting with the red piece (if you are using the same colours we did - Red, Orange, Yellow, Green & Blue/Purple) weave the red felt strip in and out of the base piece.

2. Continue with each felt strip, alternating under and over so you have a chequer board look. Wiggle each strip up tight to the one above so that all the strips fit into the base piece. Make sure you have a good length overhanging at each end.

3. Trim the ends, so that on both sides the felt strips match up to the base piece.

4. Add a dot of glue to the end of each strip to secure the felt in place to the base piece. Weigh the coasters down with a heavy book while the glue dries. (Preferably leave overnight) As you can see by the picture below, we tried to keep the ends in place with clips, but it leaves dents in the felt once dried, so the book technique was dreamed up after the first two coasters were made.

5. Wander off and leave Mummy to do all the clearing up!!

Hope you like this one - a great one to try with the kids over the holidays and good for stash busting!

We'd love to see any pictures of things you make from our tutorials, so please do send them to us at: simmi@gracesfavours.co.uk

Sew A Softie Day Tutorial - How to Start Sewing With Kids

Welcome to Grace's Favours' Sew a Softie Day Tutorial for 2016!

If you've stumbled across this post, you may not be aware of the Sew a Softie Day movement. There's a wee post about it here but in a nutshell, it's the brain child of Trixi Symonds who authors the Coloured Buttons blog and she's also the author of the book Sew Together, Grow Together.

Because kids generally love sewing and to stop it from becoming a lost art, Trixi decided to create Sew a Softie Day (the inaugural day is officially on July 16th 2016) and in the run up, for a host of bloggers to post tutorials and inspirational projects to help get people started.

I decided to get my kids involved as they both love sewing, they've both grown up seeing me sew almost every day and from a very young age, have been shown the basics.

I asked Seren (7.5 yrs) to draw an outline of her chosen animal (a cat) and we decided we could use it for Patrick's (big 5 yrs - that's how he puts it as he's almost 6!) dog too.

Based on what Seren drew, I created a pattern for them, with pointy ears for her cat and floppy ears for his dog.

To make a similar animal you will need:

- fleece or felt
- stuffing
- embroidery thread to mach your material (we used pearl cotton as it's not stranded so gets less tangled than the 6 stranded embroidery thread)
- 2 buttons for the eyes
- black thread for the mouth and nose
- pins, scissors and a pencil

How we did it:

1. The kids pinned their paper pattern pieces to two layers of fleece.

2. Then they drew around the animal shape (minus the ears) with a pencil onto the fleece.

3. Next they pinned around their drawn shape (we pinned on the outside of the shape so that they would have a seam allowance and wouldn't cut too near to the line they'd drawn)

4. Then they both cut out their body shapes.

 5. Using 1 strand of pearl embroidery cotton in the same colour as their fleece, I showed Seren and Patrick how to do running stitch and they stitched round their shape, leaving a gap between the legs of their animal for stuffing. Patrick got bored about half way through this step and had me take over, but Seren carried on and really enjoyed herself. Patrick came back and started each of the next steps, but didn't want to finish any of them, which is fine as you need to keep children engaged, but if you make them finish it they won't find it fun.

6. Then we carefully clipped nearer to the lines, so that the seams weren't too bulky and turned them right side out, through the gap we'd left.

7. We lightly stuffed each limb and firmly stuffed the head. Then I drew a line across each limb and showed the kids how to do back stitch. Seren and back stitch really hit it off and she was going great with it. Patrick had a go and got the feel for it and then wanted to watch me sew the rest up.

8. Then we stuffed the body, not too firmly as we didn't want a fat cat or dog and I showed Seren how to do a ladder stitch to close up the hole. If you want to see a video of how to ladder stitch, there's one on my You Tube channel here.

9. Then we drew a nose and mouth onto our animals using the pencil and with some black thread we stitched these details on.

10. The kids then had fun rummaging through my extensive button collection and chose the buttons they wanted to use for the eyes, which I then sewed on for both animals as this was a bit tricky once they were sewn up.

11. The last step, which somehow I didn't get a photo of, was choosing the material for the ears (Seren used the same and Patrick used part of an old Christmas onsie that didn't fit him anymore!) and we used the pattern based on Seren's drawing to cut out 4 ear pieces. We repeated the same process as for the body - draw around them, then pin 2 layers together, outside your lines so that they didn't cut too close to the line. Then we running stitched the ears up, leaving them open at the bottom and turned them the right side out and ladder stitched them to the top of the head.

And voila!! We have two very happy children with their handmade cat and dog!

They were so pleased with themselves, especially Seren who did almost the entire thing on her own! (Although she did say afterwards that she thought her cat looked slightly like a pig!!)

I haven't done a pattern as half the fun was getting them to draw the animal they wanted.

The whole process took us about 3 hours from start to finish with a break for lunch, so if you were teaching a group it would probably take 2-3 sessions depending on what age the children were and how long each session runs for.

I loved doing this with my kids... I even managed to control my urge to get everything looking perfect... the whole idea is for them to be in control - gulp!

I've loved reading everyone else's posts for Sew a Softie Day and I hope you get some inspiration from them.

Here's the list again, so you can discover some other ideas:

July 1

Trixi Symonds http://www.colouredbuttons.com

July 2

Maggy Woodley http://www.redtedart.com

Alicia Brown http://www.feltwithlovedesigns.com/

July 3

Mignon Prider www.nittensandpatches.wordpress.com

July 4

Elisa Allen https://makefilmplay.com

July 5

Hilarie Wakefield Dayton http://www.littlestitchstudionorfolk.com/blog/

July 6

Sandi Sawa Hazlewood http://craftyplanner.com/blog/

Joanna Walker http://bluebarnliving.blogspot.com

Shannon http://www.ohcreativeday.com/

July 7

MaryAnne Ko http://www.mamasmiles.com/

Domenica Tootell http://www.easysewingforbeginners.com

July 8

Stephanie Woodson http://swoodsonsays.com

Tina O’Rourke https://missdaisypatterns.com/blog/

Amie Plumley http://sewingschool.blogspot.com

July 9

Deborah Fisher http://www.fishmuseumandcircus.com

July 10

Karin Fast http://postcardsfromheidelberg.blogspot.com

July 11

Simmi Duffin http://gracesfavours.blogspot.com

July 12

Rebecca West http://www.craftcreatecalm.com

July 13

Kristi www.schnitzelandboo.com

July 14

Tracey Witts http://www.thecreativepair.com/

July 15

Amalia Rosen https://handmadebyamalia.blogspot.com

July 16

Angie Wilson http://gnomeangel.com

How To - Felt Easter Peeps Bunnies Tutorial

Being from the UK peeps aren't something I'd ever come across before, but I've seen loads of crafty peeps tutorials this year so I ordered some of the little marshmallow bunnies for my little bunnies for their Easter Egg Hunt and I thought I'd make some felt peeps too.

These are dead easy to make and would make a lovely alternative to chocolate. Or to have with chocolate!

You will need:

Felt in your chosen peep colour
Matching embroidery thread
Scrap of black felt & black thread
Scissors
Needle
Small amount of stuffing
Templates at the end of this tutorial

Instructions:

1. Cut out 2 peep bodies and 1 length of felt 1/2 inch (0.75cm) wide and 16 inches (40cm) long (and two small black eyes, one small black nose - not shown as there's always something I forget to photograph at the beginning!)

2. Using 1 strand of corresponding embroidery thread, starting on the body of the peep, whip stitch the long strip to the body.

3. Once you've gone all the way round, cut off any excess from the length of felt and stitch the ends together.

4. Next take your 3 small circles of black felt and stitch them onto the peep body in the same positions as in the picture.

5. Whip stitch the other body piece onto the long length of felt. Stop before you get to the end so there's a space for adding the stuffing.

6. Stuff the peep firmly but not so he's bulging! Whip stitch closed the hole and sit back and admire your work!

You can make these little fellas in any colours you like and they will be loved for many Easters to come I'm sure of it!

Template:

How To Make an Easy Felt Christmas Ornament - Sew Your Own Tutorial

Hello lovelies!

Hope you're all feeling nice and Christmassy? In my last post I recounted our Christmas Crafternoon and I've got Carols playing on the radio so I'm feeling really festive!

I've got a Christmas Ornament tutorial for you today:

You Will Need:

A scrap of felt 2" x 2" for the smaller circle

2 pieces of felt 3" x 3" for the larger circle and the backing circle

Embroidery thread in a range of colours

A sequin and bead per ornament

Small length of ribbon

Scissors, needle, pins

Circle templates - you can either use the ones at the end of the tutorial or draw around whatever comes to hand. Mine are 2" for the smaller circle and 2.5" for the larger circle.

Instructions:

1. Cut out 1 small circle & 2 larger circles. On the smaller circle lightly mark out a circle about 1" in diameter with a pencil (you won't see this once you are finished) and using the template, the points where the white embroidery thread comes together.

2. Stitch on the white pattern, using 2 strands of embroidery thread.

3. Draw another slightly smaller circle with your pencil and then add the grey stitches, in between the white pattern.

4. Using 2 strands of maroon embroidery thread add a french knot between each grey stitch.

5. Add your sequin and bead. To hide the thread, bring your needle up through the centre of the sequin and then thread on the bead, then take the needle back down through the hole in the sequin.

6. Add a circle of running stitch, going in and out of the white pattern with 2 strands of bright red embroidery thread. Then sandwich your ribbon between the two red felt circles and using 4 strands of pale green embroidery thread, blanket stitch around the outside of the ornament.

Et Voila! You have an ornament all ready for your tree!

Here's the Circles template:

I have used colours in my ornaments that compliment the Christmas Trees I've just created using my new pattern (available in my Etsy Shop) which I had great fun putting together and will be used to make all the Teacher and T.A. gifts for my kids this year.

Happy Sewing!

Christmas Craft Tutorials Round Up

I'm struggling to find time for everything at the moment, like all crafters, this is a rather manic time of year!

So, I've put together a little Christmas Craft Tutorial Round Up of some of my favourites this year, while I try and get it together to make up the Christmas tutorials I've got in mind for you in the next couple of weeks!

First up is something we've got really into this year - pearler beads (or Hama beads as they're also known) and this pattern could be used as a hanging ornament, a brooch or a magnet. I love this blog as it is dedicated to all things Christmas and Crafty... Just Christmas Crafts

Next a post from a couple of years ago, but still gorgeous is this super cute Glittery Santa Ornament from Parent Pretty... I love anything glittery and cannot wait to put my tree up with some of these on.

Now the next one is perfect if you have small children or animals who are a danger with glass objects... I wish I'd thought of getting these when my son was little... he was a terrorist when it came to Christmas decorations! Crochet Christmas Lights from the late Wink of A Creative Being - Wink's story is really sad and I know a lot of crafters will have come across it before, but I wanted to share one of her projects in this round up as I hope she's up there somewhere seeing how much joy people are still getting out of her amazing mind.

This one is really pretty and looks really straight forward (which is always a bonus when you're short on time as we all are in the run up to Christmas!) Pine Cone Christmas Trees from Scissors and Spoons

My favourite Christmas tutorial from this blog is the Christmas Candle which I created and shared last year.

And finally something edible! Yummy! There are some amazingly looking cookie tutorials out there, but I chose one that doesn't look 'perfect' as I didn't want to put anyone off (including me, when I try and make them!) so I've gone for these cute Melted Snowmen from Milk Bubble Tea

I hope you enjoy trying some of these crafts and keep your eyes peeled for a new Christmas Tutorial from me very soon... I promise!

How To: Halloween Spooky Spider Tutorial

In my previous post I shared some of the details of the Halloween crafts we got up to at Seren's 7th Birthday Party.

The Spooky Spiders, which were really straightforward to make, so I've done a mini-tutorial for them:

You Will Need:

Yarn (any colour)
4 Pipe Cleaners (any colours)
2 Googly Eyes
1 Large Needle
Pair of Scissors
PVA Glue (or similar)

Instructions:

1. Gather your materials.

2. Cut your pipe cleaners in half and wrap one around the middle of the other three. This will leave two legs shorter than the others, they'll be your front legs.

3. Add a blob (technical term) of glue to the centre of the pipe cleaners and stick on the end of your yarn.

4. Wrap, wrap and wrap some more! When you are happy with the plumpness of your spider, glue the end of the yarn to the bottom of your spider (Note: At this point you can chose which is the top & bottom of your spider - once you've chosen, bend the legs accordingly)

5. Add the googly eyes. If they are self adhesive, great.... if not, just add a blob (still a technical term!) to the back of each eyeball.

Your spider is finished!

If you would like to hang him up, cut off another length of yarn, thread the large needle and push the needle through one of the strands of yarn at the top of your spider. Tie off the yarn at the top and hang:

Enjoy your spider making!

We also made Felt Eyeball Coasters:

Which I've not done a full tutorial for, but have explained what we did here