New in My Shop: 3 Fun Felt Brooch Patterns - Sew Teacups, Rainclouds & Tree Stumps

I added three new PDF patterns to my shop yesterday - another bargain pattern bundle!

 

 

With this trio of simple step-by-step tutorials you can sew three different felt brooches: little teacups, rainclouds, and tree stumps.

There are clear photos and instructions for each step of the process, and different size options for the templates so you can make bigger brooches than mine if you'd like.

I used the medium teacup templates yesterday to sew this floral teacup - isn't it cute?

 

 

 
These would be so perfect for using up scraps of pretty floral fabric you can't bear to throw away. I've had that scrap of Liberty Tana Lawn in my stash for years and am so glad to have found a use for it! If I still sold handmade items I would definitely be adding this version of my little teacups design to my product range and can't help myself from picturing a whole row of brooches with different floral prints and different colours of embroidered detailing to match the fabrics.

The good news is that this is something you can do if you'd like! When you buy any patterns from my shops (including the bargain bundles) you have my permission to sell items any items you sew from them, as long as you credit me as the designer.

Click here to buy the pattern bundle from my shop - it'll be available to download and print immediately after your payment goes through! For even more of a bargain, shop before June 27th to get this bundle at the launch price.

P.S. All of these patterns were originally shared with my newsletter subscribers - click here to sign up for crafty updates from me and/or a monthly free project!

Felt Teacup Brooch Tutorial

UPDATE: this tutorial is now available as part of a bargain bundle of PDF patterns in my shop!

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September's free project for my monthly pattern newsletter subscribers is going to be a tutorial for sewing cute little felt teacup brooches!

Those of you who've been reading my blog for a long time may recognise these brooches, as I used to sell them in my Etsy shop years ago.

I took that teacup-brooches-in-a-teacup photo during my Crafting 365 project to do something crafty every day for a year and share a photo of it here on my blog and on Flickr (remember Flickr??). It ended up representing Etsy in British Vogue's "Secret Address Book", which is easily the fanciest place one of my photos has ever been featured.

(I can't believe that was almost ten years ago, my goodness.  How time flies when you're busy making stuff out of felt!)

I've stitched lots of these little teacup brooches over the years...

 

... and some of them weren't even pink!

I always loved making them and I hope you guys will love them too. Click here to subscribe then look out for the email in your inboxes later this month.

September's newsletter will also include the link to August's free project: a tutorial for making some pretty floral hoop art.

Click here for more information about my newsletters and to subscribe!

Click here to visit my tutorial archive for lots more free crafty projects.

April in Pictures: Fabric Shopping, Neglected Cups of Tea, a Sleepy Assistant and Crazy British Weather.

It's been a hectic few weeks here! I've been busy with tight deadlines and exciting travels and boring paperwork and all sorts of other stuff that has collectively got in the way of blogging!

Though I've not had time to sit down and put together a proper blog post for ages (as those of you who are bloggers yourselves will know, this stuff takes time! Take the photos, edit them, resize them, label them, upload them, write something interesting, proofread it, etc...) I have been sharing some snaps over on my new Instagram account.

I thought it would be nice to do a monthly round-up of the photos I shared on Instagram that didn't make it onto my blog. This way those of you who don't follow me on Instagram won't miss out, and I can waffle to my heart's content about what I've been up to instead of having to confine myself to a short and snappy caption that I've slooooowly typed on my smartphone keyboard (it's taking me a while to get used to that thing!!).

So, what did I get up to at the end of April?

I can rarely resist a nice bit of stationery and fell head over heels with this "Enchanting Forest" letter-writing set designed by Helen Dardik for Roger la Borde. Isn't it lush? As well as using it to write letters (of course) I've also been using the stickers to decorate other bits of post. So much prettiness.

Walking to the postbox a few days later, floral-sticker-covered-post in hand, it was lovely to spot these wildflowers growing along a fence. All those little specks of blue! Delightful.

 

Talking of flowers... I finally stitched the last few flowers onto this cushion which has been a work in progress for a while now. Have I found the time to take photos of the finished cushion? I have not. I must remember to actually do that because I am really rather chuffed with how this turned out. Although - I have to confess - I'm actually thinking about maybe adding some embroidery to this as well. I might leave it for a few months and see how I feel as that will be yet another time-consuming project to add to my To Make list!

When I'm sewing or doing other non-writing work, I listen to the same albums over and over. In late April I was listening to this one on repeat. I've had this tape for 25 years and still love it!

Escaping from my studio/office for a morning, I took a trip to Fabric Land to buy supplies for a couple of work projects. Fabric Land is not (sadly) a magical Narnia-esque world of fabric and enchanted haberdashery creatures but is actually a really great chain of sewing shops. They're an absolute treasure trove of stitch-y supplies and have helpful staff and a legendary website that's straight out of 1998. While I was in town I also popped into the knitting shop next door to buy some white yarn for my mini patchwork squares blanket. Online shopping is super convenient but nothing beats being able to buy what you need in a local shop.

 

I do a lot of working on things behind the scenes that I can't talk about, so it's always a joy when I get to finally spill the beans on a project. The six projects I contributed to Banners, Buntings, Garlands & Pennants were so much fun to make!

I gave one of these copies to my mum (she has a whole collection of books featuring my work) and the other now sits on what I half-jokingly refer to as "my ego shelf". The shelf is an ego-boosting collection of books by me, books featuring my projects, plus other nice things like the first magazine to ever feature my work in print and the photo book I made filled with six years of crafty photos.

I was completely obsessed with books when I was a kid, I spent so much time reading and dreamt of a day when I would have a house of my own with its own library (a whole room! filled with books!). Now I'm a grown up, I may not have the library I hoped for when I was a kid but a shelf of books I've been involved in creating is possibly even better.

My inner book nerd was also thrilled to spot myself (and the other contributors) listed in the index of Banners, Buntings, Garlands & Pennants. I've never been in an index before!

I work from the sofa a lot when I've got a large amount of sewing to do - it's so comfy, and my assistant keeps me company while I sew...

You can tell I was busy with work as I kept making tea and forgetting to drink it! This was the third cup that had gone cold that day as I rushed around drawing and stitching and writing and taking photos.

Part of the reason I was rushing about was to get ready for a trip to Northumberland with my mum. Planning trips in advance is very necessary, but they don't always fit in well around deadlines when the time rolls round!

We had some craaaazy weather on our trip, even for England. It hailed, it snowed, it rained, it was sunny, it hailed again! All the weather, all crammed into a few days. This was the view from our hotel room one afternoon...

 

... and this was the view on the coast just a couple of days later! Chilly, yes, but gorgeously bright and clear.

I will, of course, be blogging about our visit to Northumberland as soon as I've got the photos edited. We were only there for a few days but we visited so many great places, I'm really looking forward to sharing them with you guys.

P.S. Follow me on Instagram for regular, colourful updates!

How To: Cross Stitch Sampler Brooches

A little later than planned thanks to some tech issues (ugh)... I have a fun tutorial to share today: sew some cute cross stitch brooches with little slogans on them!

I used to make these for my shop many years ago... here are some I made earlier :)

 

As well as putting together a tutorial to show you how to make them, I've drawn up some charts so you can get stitching straight away. Hurrah!

Will you declare yourself a "COFFEE ADDICT", or proclaim "I LOVE TEA"?

Celebrate thriftiness with a "MAKE DO AND MEND" brooch or the joys of reading with a "BOOK NERD" badge?

Or explain to everyone why there's cat hair on your sweater with an "I LOVE CATS" or "CAT LADY" brooch? (There is always cat hair on my sweater).

 

Or, of course, you can always get out a pencil and some squared paper and design your own stitch-y slogans!

To make a cross stitch brooch you will need...

- the cross stitch charts provided at the bottom of this post (or your own chart)
- aida (I used white, 14 count)
- white sewing thread
- stranded embroidery thread (floss) and matching felt
- white felt
- a brooch clasp
- embroidery scissors

To make each brooch...

1. Stitch your slogan! I like to stretch my aida in an embroidery hoop to give myself a nice taught surface to stitch on.

If you've never done cross stitch before, I promise it's very easy. There are lots of beginner tutorials available online, but basically you sew two stitches through the holes in your aida to form each X... and gradually build up the design you're stitching.

I usually use half the strands of my thread (floss) when cross stitching - i.e. just using three of the six strands - but for bolder text you can use the whole thread. This isn't the world's most in-focus photo (sorry!) but it shows the difference between using three strands (top) and the whole six-stranded thread (bottom).

Here are some slogans I stitched earlier. Make sure you leave plenty of space to cut them out in the next step.

2. Iron your stitching if you need to, then cut out your slogan(s). Use the holes of the aida as a guide to help cut a neat rectangle, then trim the corners so you get a nice curved shape.

3. Using your piece of aida as a template, cut a matching piece of white felt. This will be the back of your brooch. Set it aside for the moment.

4. Stitch your cross stitch design to a piece of felt in the same colour as your letters. Use white sewing thread and whip stitch to sew the aida to the felt.

Using white thread on white aida is great because your stitches will be almost invisible... but this isn't too helpful for a tutorial! Here's the back so you can see where I've stitched. Make sure you start and finish your stitching behind the aida itself as you'll be trimming the felt in the next step.

5. Use embroidery scissors to trim away the excess felt, creating a neat frame around your stitched design. Remember not to cut too close to the edge of your stitched-on-aida - you don't want to snip your stitching!

Scallop edging looks very cute but can be a bit fiddly. If you want a less frilly look or one that's simpler to cut, just cut a plain border to frame the design.

6. Turn over the piece of white felt you cut out earlier. Sew on a brooch clasp, using a double thickness of white sewing thread.

7. Then place the front and back of your brooch together, lining up the white shapes as carefully as possible. Use small running stitches to sew the layers together (I like to follow the first row of holes in the aida) then finish your stitching neatly at the back.

And you're done! Your finished brooch will look something like this:

Click here to view the template sheet in a new tab or window and print it at 100%

This tutorial is for non commercial use only. You may borrow a couple of photos if you want to blog about this project, but remember to credit me and link back to this page on my blog, and do not reproduce my entire tutorial / share my charts on your site. Thanks!

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