Archives for October 2012

Just playing with Paints and pumpkins. 🙂

So It is time to start preparing for Christmas. Well actually it is really early for me but I’d thought I’d get  a jump on it because I had a good idea. I wanted to make lowercase letters for my neice. She is learning her letters but most the alphabets you can buy are all uppercase so I went to work trying to figure out what to do. First I thought Crochet because it is kind of my go to, but then I saw this super cute idea somewhere. (don’t remember where now) and had to try it. Crazy but I’ve never really done anything with felt so here it went.

I got 10 peices of felt from walmart. Just paper sized sheets. they were 22 cents each. So pretty cheap. Grabbed some white thread and went to work.

Step 1) Choosing your font.I found a font I liked on the computer. something round and spelt out the alphabet. I changed the font so that I fit 2-3 letters on each page horizontally. (depending on the letters). Print.

Step 2) Cutting out the letters. First I cut out the paper letters, then traced them with a permanent marker onto the felt. for each letter i did one forward and then reversed. ( for the front and the back of the letter). Then I cut the letters out of the felt putting the sides with the marker together.

Step 3) Stitch it up. This was pretty easy although a little time consuming. I tried the sewing machine first but it took way to long. Maybe some would do well this way. Second I tried sewing them up by hand by just looping around the outside.

Step 4) Stuffing. I left a little area to add stuffing before finishing it. I used a pen to get it all the way in and around where it needed to be. Then finished stitching it.

So I’ve never been one much for crafty stuff. Artsy yes…but crafts and cutsie things I’ve just never had time for. So it is new. However I have had a lot of fun this Halloween getting ready and decorating on a budget of course.

Project number 1:

Spicing up my W Wreath.

supplies:
Mesh fabric
ribbon
Construction paper

step 1: cut the fabric in half hotdog style. Then cut 3 inch strips all thew ay down. Wrap around the W, tying the knot on the outside border of the W. I did just black and then went back and tied smaller peices of orange onto the Black so I didn’t use so much fabric.

Step 2: Cut out paper letters saying whatever: EEk, Boo, Wicked. I sewed them on. Just loop it through the top of the letter and the fabric and tye a knot.

Step 3: use the construction paper to make a witches hat, and shoes and legs. I drew the legs and then added the stripes.
 I simplified this tutorial for the shoes:

and used this one for the witches hat:

and then added a ribbon to it. Just taping it and twisting it.

For the witches legs. I drew legs on a paper one black and one green. Cut it out. Black was my base color. then I cut the stripes out of the green legs using every other cut. sewed them all on and wala!

Project number 2: The Bat Tree

This one is super easy. find and tree branch. I was going to head up the canyon with my hubby but found one they had trimmed on my way to the mail box.

Cut out bats from black construction paper. Tape to string and hang from tree or ceiling.

I used this template for the bats. It also has ghosts if you want to add them as well

http://familyfun.go.com/printables/bat-ghost-patterns-for-halloween-703190/

(this is also a really good site for a lot of fun party ideas.)

Project Number 3: 
The Pom Pom Balls

For this one I got tissue paper to make the balls with

The picture about sums it up. Get tissue paper. 8 sheets of 20×30. of course for halloween I got orange and black with a little white.

1. stack the tissue paper and fold like a fan

2. cut the ends to a rounded corner

3. get wire. I used the twisty tyes that come with bags. Tye around the center.

3. Pull paper out one by one from center. and there you go. I attached a string and hung it from the wall

for more of a halloween touch I went back to the dandy construction paper and cut out some words to go along with it. 🙂