Freebies & Patterns

10 December, 2016

Holiday Ornament Tutorial: Frosty Polar Bears

beckarahn2016-12-09T23:05:51-06:00Freebies & Patterns, Tutorials|Comments Off on Holiday Ornament Tutorial: Frosty Polar Bears

Materials

6 x 6 inches of white felt
6 x 6 inches pale blue, grey or green felt
white embroidery thread, white sewing thread
an assortment of white, clear, silver and pale blue sequins, any shape or size
white, clear or silver seed beads
narrow ribbon, about 6 inches long

Tools

Small sharp scissors
Beading needle
Embroidery sewing needle

A note about the sequins I used: I found snowflake shaped sequins in the scrapbooking section at the craft store and I think they were really perfect on this snow bear. You can also find squares, stars and other shapes.

Instructions

1. Right-click or option-click the bear pattern below and save it to your computer. Then print it out. Using the pattern, cut out one bear from white felt.

2. Thread your beading needle with a piece of regular sewing thread. Tie a knot in the end. Poke the needle through from back to front, where you would like one sequin to be.

3. Thread a sequin, then a seed bead on to the needle. Stitch back through the hole in the sequin, back through the fabric and pull the thread snug. The bead will hold the sequin in place. Cover the bear shape with as many or as few sequins as you like.

4. Continue to stitch the rest of the sequins in the same way. Be careful not to pull the thread too tight between stitches making the felt pucker. When you have finished adding sequins, tie off your thread on the back and trim the ends. You can add just a few or cover the bear with sparkles. That’s up to you.

5. Place your be-spangled bear on the colored felt. Thread a needle with embroidery thread and tie a knot in the end. Poke the needle from front to back just inside the edge of the bear. Pull the thread until it stops at the knot.

6. Blanket stitch around the edge of your bear. As you get to the top of the bear’s back, fold the ribbon in half, place the cut ends of the ribbon between the layers of felt and stitch them into the blanket stitch as well.

7. Trim the extra colored felt about 1/8 inch bigger than the bear, leaving an outline of the colored felt. Be careful not to trim the ribbon.

8 December, 2016

Holiday Ornaments: Deer in the Headlights Tutorial

beckarahn2016-12-08T12:35:43-06:00Freebies & Patterns, Tutorials|Comments Off on Holiday Ornaments: Deer in the Headlights Tutorial

I made these little deer ornaments originally as gifts for my co-workers one year. A friend took one look at the goggle-eyed deer and said “That’s what deer in the headlights look like.” The name stuck.

Materials

felt, 4×5 inch piece in any color
embroidery thread and sewing thread, any color
scrap of fabric about 4 by 5 inches
fusible paper-backed webbing (like Heat N Bond Lite or Wonder Under)
8 mm sequins, white or another pastel color
a few dark colored seed beads

Tools

pencil
beading needle or small sewing needle
iron & ironing board
small sharp scissors like Fiskars microtip

Instructions

1. Right-click or option-click on the deer pattern piece to save the pattern piece below to your computer. Then print it out. Trace the deer pattern on to the paper backed fusible webbing. Following the instructions on the packaging, iron it to fuse it on to the back of your scrap fabric.

2. Cut out your deer.

3. Peel off the paper backing from the felt deer and place the deer, glue side down, on to a piece of felt. Iron to fuse it in place. Note: If you are using acrylic felt rather than wool felt, please test a scrap first to make sure it doesn’t melt when you iron it.

4. Cut out around your deer again, leaving about 1/8 inch border of felt all the way around.

5. To make the eyes, thread your beading needle with a piece of regular sewing thread. Tie a knot in the other end. Poke the needle through from back of the deer to front, where you would like one eye to be. Pull until it stops at the knot.

6. Thread a sequin and then a seed bead on to the needle. Poke the needle then back through the hole in the sequin, and back through the fabric. Pull the thread snug. The bead will hold the sequin in place. Repeat for the other eye. Tie off your thread on the back and trim the ends.

7. With a 6 inch piece of embroidery thread, stitch through the felt between the antlers and make a loop to hang your deer. Tie the ends together.

7 December, 2016

Holiday Ornaments: Becky’s Birdies Tutorial

beckarahn2016-12-07T14:15:17-06:00Freebies & Patterns, Tutorials|1 Comment

I decided to give you all a gift this year. For many years I sold patterns for all kinds of things in my Etsy shop, including a bunch of simple holiday ornaments. But I have really changed the focus of my shop and what I am doing and I phased out those patterns a while ago. But I still have them and they are really cute and they shouldn’t just sit here on my computer with no one using them. So I decided that I would post them here for free as my gift to you.

The first one is a variation on an ornament I made with my mom when I was about 2 years old. She says I “helped”. I have the original on my Christmas tree and used it as the inspiration for this pattern.

Materials

two pieces of felt, 4 x 6 inches each in 2 coordinating colors
6 inch piece of narrow ribbon
embroidery thread in a coordinating color

Tools

scissors
sewing needle
pins

Instructions

1. Pin the pattern pieces to the felt and cut two birds and two wings.

2. Place the bird pieces so that they are facing opposite directions. Lay one wing on each of the bird pieces. Adjust and pin in place.

3. Using embroidery thread that matches the wing color, stitch each wing to the body piece.

4. Cut a 6 inch piece of ribbon and fold in half. Put the two bird body pieces together, wing sides out, sandwiching the ends of the ribbon in between. Pin to hold the ribbon in place.

5. Stitch around the outside edge of the bird, through both layers of felt. Fold the wings back out of the way as you stitch.

You can use a running stitch, a whip stitch, or a blanket stitch, depending on what look you like. Be sure to catch the ribbon in your stitches to hold it in place. When you have stitched all the way around, tie a knot and you are finished.

Here are the pattern pieces. Just option-click or right-click the image to save it to your computer and you can print it out.

Holiday Ornament Tutorial: Frosty Polar Bears

Materials

Tools

Instructions

Holiday Ornaments: Deer in the Headlights Tutorial

Materials

Tools

Instructions

Holiday Ornaments: Becky’s Birdies Tutorial

Materials

Tools

Instructions

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