Thursday, December 19, 2013

Witches Stiches Printed Fabric Strawberries


I wanted to have some fabric strawberries hanging in my living room so I decided to make some. They are so quick and easy. I wanted to make one with printed fabric but all I had was some tea dyed solid feed sack fabric. So I decided to give it a printed look with stamps. You can run fabric through the printer but some fabric is too thin. The feed sack fabric I have is way too thin to run through. So here is what I did.
Step 1 – Making the strawberry. All you have to do is cut a piece of freezer paper in the shape of a triangle with two long sides and one short. The size of the triangle is up to you. You can make it 3”or 13”. The one I made is 4” long. So cut your shape and set it aside.




Step 2 – Stamping the fabric. I wanted a background. So I stamped that first. I used a large script stamp. Then I added other pictures on top of that. You can use regular stamps and ink, the same kind you would use for paper. Place the pattern on the fabric so you know where to start stamping. Cut your fabric in a square large enough to fit your pattern. Ink up your background stamp and lay the fabric on it and press down. Now do it to a second piece of fabric. Remember the stamped side is now your right side of the fabric. With right sides together place your pattern on the fabric. If you hold it up to the light you can see the stamped image and place the pattern where you want it. Now iron your freezer paper pattern on your fabric, SHINNY SIDE DOWN, sew around the pattern leaving the short side open.  Peel pattern off, cut out around sewing line and turn to the right side. Stuff your strawberry and then hand stitch a running stitch around the opening so you can pull it tight and gather it closed. Knot it off. 
 
 
Step 3 - Make the top of the strawberry by just drawing a star on the wrong side of whatever fabric you want, cut it out. We are not going for a perfect star; you don’t want the points to be exactly the same. Cut out your star and glue it to the top of the strawberry. This will cover where you gathered it. I just use the white craft glue in the gold bottle.
Step 4 – Make a wire loop for hanging. If you are going to be putting your berries in a bowl skip this step. I wanted mine hanging. Cut a piece of wire about an inch and a half long. Fold it in half and twist the two ends together, I used needle nose pliers for this. Poke a hole in the top of the berry, I used a craft knife. Put a touch of glue on the wire loop and stick the end that is twisted into the hole. I used tea stained string to hang them. If you want you can sew your ribbon or string to the top of the berry.
 
I made 3 strawberries; two out of homespun and one stamped and hung them on an old stuffed feed sack. I also did this with hearts.  
 
You can use any shape you want and any fabric and just stamp it. Thanks for reading and if you have any questions please give me a shout.
Thanks, Faith