Ask Design Mom: Felt Crafts & Paper Embroidery

The talented and creative Cindy from the really, really wonderful craft blog Skip To My Lou, is our 2nd Guest Expert! Take a look at what she has to say.



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Ask-Design-Mom Question:
Hi Design Mom. I love working with felt and I love hand embroidery and want help thinking of some new projects. Do you have any good projects for home, gifts, or kids that involve either? Or good sites to go to? I'm also wondering about hand-embroidered cards — what materials work best? And would I need a backing for these? Thanks!! — Carrie

Guest Expert Answer:

FELT CRAFTS
I see a a lot of talk about felt these days. There are some really creative people out there making some amazing things. There are various kinds of felt. There are inexpensive felt squares sold in craft stores, usually made from acrylic fibers. Fabric stores will sell a heavier version of this on bolts and you can also find wool felt. I would use wool felt for anything you want to put a lot of time and effort into and that you want to last. You can also buy old wool sweaters from thrift stores and make your own felt. It is really simple to do — I have done it many times by accident.


-Betz White is making some beautiful things with felted wool sweaters. She has appeared on Martha Stewart making her teacup pin cushions. She has a darling bunny tutorial on her blog.

-Bella Dia makes beautiful felt pin cushions and a spectacular tea cozy out of felt.

-Here is a link for a cute felt bunny pin tutorial by Maize. Her site is full of great ideas using embroidery and felt.

-Anna Maria Horner has a fabulous felt garland and ornaments. Here is a tutorial for her cute felt owl ornament.


-I loved making felt food for my daughter to play with. It was simple and I used the inexpensive felt squares. You can see a picture here. In fact, I will post a tutorial here at Design Mom in a few weeks about making felt food. I receive tons of inspiration for felt food from Colorfool Blog and My Paper Crane.


PAPER EMBROIDERY
Here is a link on how to embroider on paper. This can be done by hand or on the sewing machine. I could imagine some beautiful cards made with bits of felt and embroidery embellishments. I have sewn a lot of paper on my sewing machine. I find if I use card-stock weight I usually have no problem and no need for backing. It does dull your needle so make sure you change it before sewing on fabric.

-Here are some free stitching patterns for cards. This could be a great way to get kids stitching.


-Lisa Solomon does some clever embroidery on paint chips.

I hope you are inspired!
Cindy from Skip to My Lou



Note from Design Mom:
Thank you Cindy! So many great ideas and useful links. I think I could spend a week browsing craft blogs and never tire of it. If you're a mom on the lookout for clever, kid-appropriate crafts, make sure to bookmark Skip To My Lou — you won't be disappointed.