Fabric Scrap Flower Tags

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How sweet are these tags?!!  With such pretty colours and fun fabrics, what’s not to love about them??  You can make your own in a few easy steps.

You will need:

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Fabric  Scraps (you will need pieces at least 10 inches long to make the flower bases)

Scissors

Thread

Needle

Pin (if you want to hold things together rather than use your fingers)

Sewing machine

Step 1

If you don’t already have fabric strips available in your scrap basket, then cut pieces at least 10 inches long x 1 inch wide.  The wider your fabric, the bigger the flower.

My strips in the photo came straight out a fabric scrap bag I bought online.  As you can see, they are wonky and vary in width.  They don’t have to be perfect, just long enough to make the base!

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Step 2

Put right sides together and sew along the small open edge.  I like to back stitch at the beginning and end of each one.

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Step 3

Grab your needle and thread as we’re going to sew the base 🙂  Keep your fabric right sides together and secure a stitch or two near the machine sewn edge.  Now sew a running stitch all the way around and bring your needle back out around where you started.  My stitches were about 1 inch in length and about 1 inch apart, they don’t have to be perfect, no-one is going to see them.

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Step 4

Pull carefully on the thread, the fabric will gather and your flower will start to take shape.  Sew a few stitches through some of the pleats just to hold them in place.

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 Step 5

Cut out  2 or 3 various sized circles and place them on top of the flower.  If you need to, secure with the pin if you want to hold things together for the sewing machine.  Place your flower on the tag ( I like to put mine on the left hand side but you can put them anywhere) and carefully start sewing around the inner circle 2 or 3 times.

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And that is you!! All done and ready to impress with new pretty tags!!

Until next time,

Fiona x

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Fabric Scrap Flower Headband

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I decided to tackle my overflowing fabric scrap basket (yeah, ok, BASKETS!!!) and thought I’d make my daughter a pretty headband.  This also served as a moment of inspiration for new possible items I could make for Peony Rose Handmade!

 

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What You’ll Need:

Headband

Fabric  scraps

Felt

Scissors

Glue – hot glue is best

Sewing machine – or you could hand sew them just as nicely 🙂

 

Step 1 

IMG_5106Cut varying sizes of fabric circles and layer them with a few felt circles.  You will need to put at least one felt circle at the bottom to help give your pretty flower some structure.  I decided to put of all my felt layers at the bottom but you could layer them anyway you want 🙂

 

 

Step 2

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Now it’s time to make some leaves or if you don’t want to add them, then skip this bit.  I prefer to cut my leaf shapes from the fabric first and add them to a bigger piece of felt.  This makes for easier sewing with the sewing machine.  Once you’ve sewn the fabric pieces onto the felt, trim around the shape carefully, leaving a border to help the fabric ‘pop’.

 

Step 3

IMG_5112Time to  sew the leaves to the flower.  Place your leaves in the desired position under your flower and transfer it to the sewing machine.  Carefully place the needle on top of the bottom layer but UNDER all of the other layers.  Slowly sew around the flower 2 or 3 times to make sure everything is secure.  You can of course sew on top of the other layers, but this was my preference at the time.

 

Step 4

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Almost there!  Time to glue the flower to your headband.  First, cut a circle of felt that is slightly smaller than the flower.  This will conceal your glue and make it comfortable for wearing.

Decide the final position of the flower and attach it using a small strip of glue on the RIGHT side of the actual headband (ie the side of the headband that faces upwards).  Now flip it over and glue on EITHER side of the headband and attach your felt circle.

Congratulations!!  You’ve just made a pretty (awesome!!) flower headband!!

 

 

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My Love Affair with Selvedge Edges

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I have a weakness for selvedge edges.  Pure and simple.  Their pretty colours, prints and variety of texts used, sing out to me.  I love them so much, I’ll admit that I sometimes buy fabric JUST to get my hands on those ‘sew’ darned cute selvedge’s!!

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So this year I decided to challenge myself and create a quilt using my stash of selvedge’s and have been working on creating blocks since January.  If I get a few spare moments at the weekends, I’ll work on sewing up a block or two.  I’m using the Quilt As You Go method to save time, and also for ease and whizz seeing as I’ve never made a quilt before.

This weekend was the first I’ve worked on it for a while, and it felt good seeing those selvedges come alive.  While progress isn’t as quick as I’d like it to be, I’m getting there slowly but surely.

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I’ll keep you updated of my progress and if you would like to see a tutorial on how to create your own selvedge quilt then just give me a shout!

Until next time

Fiona x

 

Pretty Paper Envelopes

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Pretty Notecards

I don’t know what it is about making envelopes, but I’ll find any excuse to get the paper, scissors and glue out to create them.  However, this time I thought I’d make them using a different method……by sewing machine!!

I have an old book that I’ll be using as a journal later so I removed the pages from it.  As you can imagine, this  left me with a big bundle of paper!   Of course, these just cried out ENVELOPES to me!!!

They are really easy to make and can be whipped up (or in this case, sewn up!) in a jiffy.

 Here’s how I went about making mine 🙂

Step 1

Get yourself an old book (charity shops are a great place to find them cheaply, mine was only £0.50!!) and carefully remove the pages.   Trim up and neaten the edges.  I trimmed mine to approx 5″ x 9″

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Step 2

Next, fold the bottom of the page upwards stopping at approx 1.5″ from the top.  Crease along the bottom.

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Step 3

Turn your envelope over so that the FRONT  (the side that doesn’t show the folded part) is facing upwards.  At approx 1.5″ from the top right hand side, start sewing,  back stitching slightly to secure the first few stitches.  Continue sewing all the way around and stop 1.5″ from the top p.  Back stitch again.

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That’s you!! You’ve made your very own paper envelope 🙂

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I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and please do feel free to share it with others 🙂

Until next time,

Fiona x

Mother’s Day Handmade Gift Ideas

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If, like me, you’ve left buying a Mother’s Day Gift to the last minute, here are my Top 5 handmade gift ideas from Etsy.  Even though my mum always tells my sisters and myself not to buy her anything, I always get her a little something anyway.

These are all from UK shops.

1. Scented drawer sachets from designSix5

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Aren’t these just gorgeous?!

2.  Lavender Bath Melts from SqueakyCleanSkinCare

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I always LOVE getting ‘smellies’ as gifts!

3.  Notebook set from Peony and Thistle

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Who doesn’t love a pretty notebook?!

4.  Metal bookmark from The Silver Birdcage

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I really love the sentiment on this bookmark

5.  A pretty trinket bowl from Jane Booth Ceramics

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I always have a soft spot for things with birdies on them!

Until next time!

Fiona x

 

Blooming Lovely – Paper Scrap Flowers

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PicMonkey Image.jpgAren’t these so sweet!  Who wouldn’t delight in receiving one as a Thank You or ‘Just Because’ card? They are fun and so easy to make (perhaps a little addictive I might add) and kids would enjoy making them too.

For me, the beauty of these flowers is that they are perfectly imperfect, with their wonky sizes and shapes, they are pretty much everything I love about handmade!!

You will need:

Paper scraps – any colours, textures you want

Scissors

Glue – I use Tombow

Optional

6 x 4 pieces of card (blank on one side) if you plan to use them for cards.  You could also use them on tags!

Got everything? Great! Then let’s get started:

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STEP 1 – Creating the leaves

Top Tip: use various colours & patterns for each pair of leaves, it gives you a fun & funky look!

  • Look out green papers from your scrap pile, these will become your leaves.
  • Cut them into approx 1.5″ x 2″ pieces (or smaller/bigger/fatter/thinner depending on the look you want to achieve)
  • Starting from one of the bottom corners, cut upwards in a gentle curve to the opposite corner at the top. Turn and repeat.
  • Set aside for later

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STEP 2 – Creating the flowers

This is where the fun really begins!!  You can be as creative as you like here and add as many layers as you want.

Top Tip: cut out as many flowers as you need BEFORE gluing, it’s much quicker than making one flower at a time.

  • Start off by cutting your smallest circle first. Mine are usually approx 1″ in diameter but anything goes here.  No need for it to be a perfect circle.
  • Now sit that on top of the paper you want to use as the next layer. Using it as a guide, carefully trim around leaving a border.  Again, you can do what you like here, fat border or skinny border, it doesn’t matter.
  • Repeat this until you have achieved the layering or size of flower you want. My flowers usually work out at a finished size of approx 2.5″
  • Keep making the flowers like this until you have as many as you want to make.
  • When you are ready to glue the layers together, start by adding a tiny amount of glue to the TOP of the bottom layer, add the next layer and repeat until all layers have been added.

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STEP 3 – Adding the leaves to your pretty flowers

Top Tip: Use a pencil to mark a guide whereabouts  the leaves will be hidden under the flower. Glue BELOW this line just to make sure no glue spills over to the front of the flower.

  • Start by selecting 2 leaves – I like to use 2 different styles but anything goes.
  • BEFORE you glue anything, position where you would like the leaves to be.  I like to overlap mine as shown in the photo.
  • Once you are happy with the look, carefully turn everything over, face down.
  • Lift up your leaves and apply a small amount of glue to base of the flower to where the first leaf will be attached.
  • Attach first leaf, add a spot more glue to the back of it, and attach the second one.

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STEP 4 – Adding your pretty flowers to cards

If you are using them for cards, then simply fold over your 6 x 4 pieces of card and attach your flower with glue.

Well done!! Give yourself a pat on the back, you have just created unique & individual pretty paper flowers.  Now go and show them off!

Until next time

Fiona x