Flower Turkeys

Yesterday on her day off of school, my daughter had some cute friends over. We had a crafting day. We made flower turkeys. (We first saw the idea on Our Best Bites and it's also on Crafting in the Rain).

These are quick, easy and really cute. Minimal supplies needed. You may even have all or most of them around your house right now. We glued ours onto clothespins or hair clips.

I have LOTS of silk flowers lying around from when we made a bunch of hair flowers. So I was thrilled to find a new and oh so clever use for them.

 

Jersey (Sea Anemone) Pom Pom Tutorial

This fun little pom pom made from jersey knit fabric would make a fun pin or gift topper. Here we make it into a hair clip. Doesn't it sort of look like a sea anemone? :)

Supplies Needed:

Knit Fabric (I used my leftovers from this scarf)

Cutting mat and rotary cutter

Clothespins

Pom pom maker or piece of cardboard

Small piece of felt

Alligator clip (covered with ribbon)
Glue Gun
Scissors

Step 1 - Cut the Fabric
You don't need a lot of fabric but it does help if it's rather long so your strips are continuous. This makes them easier to wrap. My strips ended up being 3/4" wide and 2.5 yards long.

I found the best way was to fold it over several times (notice your edge is curling--you want that, but it's hard to cut this way). I clipped the curled edges as flat as I could with some clothespins and cut off the ragged edge and discarded it.


See that nice clean, edge! I then cut 3/4" strips.

TIP - When I was all through cutting the strips, I pinned my fabric because I can never get this nice of a straight line with knit! I'm storing the fabric this way for the next time I need to cut it.

Step 2 - Stretch the Knit to Curl Your Strips

Go through all your strips and pull them gently to get them to curl in on themselves. You'll see. It's like magic. (FYI: You can also knit with the strips once you've done this to them. See my t-shirt purse at the bottom of this post.)

Step 3 - Wrap Your Pom Pom Maker

I have the Clover XL Pom Pom Maker, but you can use your favorite method--a rectangle of cardboard works fine.  (I found the Pom Pom Maker on e-bay.)

I used almost 2 full 2.5 yards long strips on each arm of my pom pom maker. You can adjust this to suit your needs. 

Step 4 - Cut the Fabric and Tie The Pom Pom

I used a thin strip of knit to tie it off and that worked well.

Step 5 - Trim It Up and Glue a Felt Circle to the Back

Step 6 - Glue an Alligator Clip to the Back

And you're done!

They're Baaaaack

This is the first time I've ever made them, but I know they aren't new. Yo-yo's are back in a big way and I, for one, am happy about it. They are fun, quick, and easy!

These three have alligator clips on the back to use as hair bows or even a lapel pin. (My daughter sometimes just clips the alligator clip to the strap of a tank dress).

The blue fabric on the blue and yellow one is from an old doll stroller that we just decided we could part with (even though it's been broken for years). I cut the seat part off of it because I love the fabric. It was just enough to make this yo-yo and maybe one more smaller one. I love finding new uses! :)

Here's What We Do...

When the boys are away. :) The boys of our house were away at Scout Camp this week. So my daughter and I had "Girl's Week". Part of Girl's Week is always crafting. We pulled out our Dollar Store and Walmart flowers and went to work making these hair flowers.

My daughter picked out the ones she wanted and the ones to send to her cousins.

 One quick thing, these two were both made from the same exact kind of flowers. Just layered differently. That's the fun part--trying different designs and combinations until you get what you like. Then choose the beads or buttons you want for the center.

(Here's my tutorial on how to make them.)

A Relief Effort

A little while ago I got an e-mail from my sister where she admitted to almost buying some hair bows for my niece. Buying?!? Uh, no. So "Hairbows for Haley" was started. :)

My daughter went through her bows and chose some Haley might like. Recycling--this is a green effort! And then we made her some new ones. (Stay tuned for a tutorial on the turquoise one).

It was fun to send off this fun little package to my sweet little niece!

New Hair Flowers

I found a $3 4th of July artificial flower arrangement at Walmart today. It was awful! But I knew for $3 I could make something fun with the flowers.

I made both of these hair flowers using this method. The Patriotic Hair Flower if for my daughter. I just layered 3 of the flowers from the arrangement and used 3 beads in the center. She's excited to wear this for the 4th of July. The white and pink one is for my daughter's friend. The white is from the Walmart flowers. I then layered a soft pink one, a soft cream and a pink button. Very feminine! I still have 4 flowers left from my bargain arrangement--$3 well spent!

ETA: 06/21/10 - I went back to Walmart and the Dollar Tree and bought more flowers... :) More hair flowers are coming.

Silk Flower Hair Clip Tutorial

My daughter and I got a little crafty this week and made some hair flowers for friends and cousins. Here's a quick tutorial on how to make them.

Supplies:

Silk Flowers (ours aren't silk, but what else do you call them?)

Alligator hair clips

Buttons or beads

Glue gun

Needle and thread

1/4" -1/2" wide ribbon

Small pieces of felt 

Step 1 - Take the flowers apart removing all the plastic centers and stems and backs. You can discard these. You don't need them for the hair flowers.

Step 2 - Layer the flowers together the way you want them. For this one, we did 3 different sizes of flowers on one hair clip.

Step 3 - Sew the button on. We topped this one off with a small pink button. You can also used beads. Sew a felt circle on the back as you're sewing on the button--creating a button, flower, felt sandwich.

Step 4 - Since the felt is only held on by a couple of stitches, tack it with some more glue around the edges.

Step 5 - Attach the alligator clip. I like to cover the top of my alligator clips with 1/4" ribbon. This helps it to stick to the felt better.

Step 6 - Wear it proudly!

Novelty Yarn Hair Elastic

Fuzzy Ponys


Pattern: I used this tutorial on about.com as a guide to do single crochet around an elastic hair band. 


Yarn: Patons Allure in Black 


This is super quick and fun! With the novelty yarn I found that one time around with the stitches scrunched really close together was enough. I have also made these with Moda Dea Zing and it was really cute! It's a great use for all the novelty yarn you have lying around and it uses just a small amount of yarn.

Rolled Fabric Rose Hair Bow and More

There are wonderful tutorials all over the place for these rolled fabric roses. I personally do a combination of a few different methods. I tear a strip of fabric about 2" wide and about 14" long. I fold it over to make a thinner strip. I then just roll the fabric, holding the center between my thumb and fingers and going around and around until I have a rose I'm happy with. I do twist the fabric as I go to make it more interesting--this gives you a raw edge every once in a while which I like. Twist and roll, twist and roll. :)

Then, with a glue gun, I glue the end of the fabric strip down and put a lot of hot glue on the bottom of the rose, making sure to get some glue on each layer and some extra goopiness in the center. I then place the rose on a piece of felt. I do that two more times. (The smaller rose it just fabric that was shorter than 14"). Then I cut away the excess felt.

Then what? The green one above is a hair bow. I just added a little felt loop on the back to hold an alligator clip. This way the alligator clip can be removed and the roses can also be slipped right onto a headband.

I love giving these little hair bows as part of a gift--I always use them as the bow on the package. Just clip it to a card and attach it to a package and you're good to go. (This one was for my daughter's friend--a sweet 7 year old who LOVES hair accessories.)

I have also used the rolled roses around the house. The possibilities are endless. It's such a great way to add some country charm to an item and it's a great use for those small strips of fabric you have lying around the house!

These Are So Fun!

I found this tutorial a few weeks ago and have been collecting "burnable" fabric ever since.  I made these 3 hair barrettes in a matter of minutes!

I totally cruise the remnants/clearance rack at my local craft store because lots of my projects use just small amounts of fabric so I have a drawer full of ends and damaged pieces. I just cut out what I need and there you have it. So I have quite a stack of chiffon and satin for more of these fun flowers. And now I have a use now for those 2 bridesmaid dresses I have in my closet right now! :)

These little sweeties are for my daughter's friends who are getting baptized in the next few weeks. One for each. We clipped them on a little card and my daughter wrote a note. One of the girls actually put it in her hair THE MINUTE we gave it to her and wore it the whole day. I love that!

These Things Are Like Rabbits...

They are so fun to make, they just seem to multiply. I started with just a few for my daughter, but they were such a huge hit I decided to make more.

Hair Blossoms are in my bumblebina ETSY shop now.

I'm a Little Obsessed...

I seriously can't stop making Halloween stuff. Got the instructions for these hair bows here. Any kind of hair bow you wanna make, they have the instructions for.


I've even got my kids in on the fun. We saw these shirts in Family Fun and knew we had to do them. Then it sort of expanded to jeans and socks too. :)

Crafty Stuff Today...

I was in the studio all day today making stuff. But probably not what you'd expect. I made these for a hair bow class I'm teaching next month for church. This is the sample:



And I made this pillow for my daughter (of course eventually she'll get the hair bows too):

I have a theory that if something is easily accessible, you'll use it and if it's not, you won't. So I've been completely re-arranging my studio to make things more accessible. For example, my sewing machine used to be buried under a bunch of stuff...
Well, theory proven. I opened my cabinet, saw it just sitting there with nothing piled on top of it and all my fabric scraps neatly arranged and I pulled it out to make this pillow! The pillow is 9" x 9". The picture makes it look a little bigger than that.

I put it on her bed while she was at school and when she saw it, I heard, "Ohhhhh...." and a giggle. That's a good sign. Here it is on her bed. (Oh yes folks, that is pink faux fur. Only the best for the Princess Palace!) :)