Addie Baby

I need a Pintervention. Really. I love Pinterest and all of the inspired ideas I’m finding there. If you haven’t joined, please do. Thanks to Pinterest, I have a growing collection of super cute decorations around my house and a craft to-do list that’s a mile long. There are not enough days in the week for me to get all of these projects done. If you have no idea what it is, you should check it out. If you need an invitation, email me (theruffings at gmail dot com) and I will send you one.

On to my latest project.

This Felt Christmas Tree project has been making the rounds on Pinterest. When I saw it I knew that Addie Baby was the perfect age to really get into something like this. I also knew that Charlotte would try to rip it off the wall and eat the ornaments. But I can’t let this little destructive phase that Charlotte’s going through stop us from having some holiday fun!

This is a simple, simple project which has the potential to be as ornate and intricate as you’d like to make it. I kept it simple. I knew that most of the fun for Addie would be in helping me create the ornaments so I had to let go of creative control in that area of the project.

Supplies for this are simple:

Green Felt – I bought a yard of it at Hobby Lobby and have some left over. I don’t know anything about fabric but it was folded over and was very wide when unfolded.
Chalk
Different color sheets of felt – for the ornaments
Scissors
Hot Glue Gun
Thumtacks

Optional: Envelope to house your ornaments
1 sheet of reversible scrapbook paper (Christmas theme is good)
Ribbon
Glue (hot glue, glue dots, double sided tape, glue stick)

Time commitment: If I were working alone? Maybe 2 hours. Remember, I had my 4 year old assistant helping me with the ornaments and the envelope. We made a morning out of it and added another 1.5-2 hours to the project.

Cost: I spent about $9 for the felt and Scrapbook paper, everything else came from my craft box.

Let’s get to it, shall we?

I measured the wall where I wanted the tree and then I measured my oldest daughter because I knew I wanted the tree to be about her height. I decided a 43″ tree would be perfect for us because – leaving room for the baseboard and another inch or so above it – the tree would be just slightly taller than Addie.

For as much as I craft, I am terrible at sketching and drawing. I knew I could never free-hand the Christmas Tree shape onto the felt. Then I remembered that I was married to someone who is secretly artistic and annoyingly good at just about everything. I folded the felt in half and asked Scott to draw half of a 43″ Christmas Tree against the folded edge with a piece of chalk.

Then I cut along the chalk lines and hung the tree on the wall.

First I hung it with Glue dots and they worked great for 15 minutes and then the tree fell down. Then I hung it with this super thick double sided sticky stuff. When I woke up this morning, the tree was on the floor. It seems as though felt sticks to felt, but nothing else will stick to felt. The solution I came up with was to hot glue thumb tacks to the back of 1 star (for the top of the tree) and 8 various ornaments to put at the end of each of the “branches”. This has worked out great, and Charlotte can’t even pull them out of the wall.

To make the ornaments I used sheets of felt and cut out shapes: stars, stockings, and balls. I bought 5 sheets of felt. I’ve made A LOT of ornaments and still have felt to spare. The fun part was decorating the ornaments with Addie. We used markers, sequins, glitter glue and puffy t-shirt paint. I didn’t buy anything special for this, I just used whatever we had around the house. I also left a bunch of ornaments plain and will pull them out for Addie to decorate next time she tells me she’s bored at 6:30 in the morning before I’ve had my coffee. That will likely be tomorrow.

Now, let’s talk ornaments. I was dubious. I had Velcro in my basket at Hobby Lobby. I didn’t think that the felt ornaments would just stick on the tree without any help, but they do! Felt sticks to felt. I’m a believer.

Next I made this nifty little envelope for Addie to store her ornaments in while not in use.

I loosely used these directions. I say loosely because I don’t have enough patience to actually get out a ruler and measure or cut a straight line. So I looked at the diagram and I just started cutting my scrapbook paper until it looked roughly like the picture. Then I folded it and secured the flaps with Glue Dots. Is it wonky? Yes. It’s crooked and I had to trim a little here and tuck a little there, but it’s cute. And it doesn’t have to meet USPS regulations. It’s just hanging on my wall.

Then I grabbed a spool of ribbon from my craft drawer and hot glued the ends to the inside of the envelope to hang on the wall. I like the double sided scrapbook paper because it’s decorative on the inside as well as the outside. Like with the thumbtacks I used to secure the tree, I hot glued a thumbtack to a gold bow I had in my Christmas decorations and pinned the envelope to the wall next to the tree. Voila!

And Addie loves it. LOVES IT! I was worried here interest would wane after she finished decorating the ornaments but she loves hanging ornaments on the tree, putting them back in the envelope and redecorating it later. I love that it’s something festive and fun for her. And it’s the only time you’ll see multi-colored lights on a tree in my home.

A few weeks ago while  getting my daily Pinterest fix – probably while standing in the kitchen fixing lunch for the kids -  I came across an adorable ribbon turkey shirt.  And since I don’t have any crafts lined up for Thanksgiving, I thought I would try to recreate for my girls.

Cute, right?

Unlike many Pinterest projects, the link associated with this picture didn’t take me to any instructions.  Boo.  After some Google Image fishing, I saw a lot of variations of this shirt for sale on Etsy.  They’re adorable and yes, I could buy them, but I love the feeling of accomplishment that comes with seeing a project through.  So, I went out and gathered my supplies not really knowing how it was all going to come together. The only thing I really knew was that this little turkey would somehow need to get on that shirt without the aid of a sewing machine.  Not only do I not sew, if you put me in front of a sewing machine, I wouldn’t be able to thread the needle.

I did a little more research online, this time just searching for “kid’s turkey shirts”.  I found some adorable shirts on The Cottage Home complete with a detailed tutorial and printable turkey body template.  Score!  Even though the shirt on this site wasn’t exactly the ribbon shirt I had been planning, I knew I could modify the instructions to fit my project.   I sent the inspiration picture to a few friends and they were on board.  We planned a night to get together, drink some wine and craft.  My favorite kind of Girl’s Night Out (or in).

After reading through the very helpful tutorial on The Cottage Home I realized the missing link in my no-sew turkey shirt project was this:

I ran out to Jo-Ann Fabrics the next morning and picked it up.  To my surprise it was really cheap too.  $3.99 and it just happened to be 50% off this week.  I was meant to do this project!  Though if you don’t have a Jo-Ann’s near you, WalMart carries something similar in the fabric section.

One caveat about this shirt:  It’s held together with a dream and a prayer and a dab of hot glue.  I don’t think it will stand up very well in the wash. In fact, I wouldn’t even attempt it.  I went into this craft knowing that it would likely be a one-or-two-wear shirt.  If you’re okay with that, then keep reading!

Without further ado, here is everything you’ll need to make your very own No-Sew Turkey Ribbon Shirt.

Materials:

Steam-a-Seam

Scissors

Iron

Glue Gun (or fabric glue)

1 Plain T-Shirt: I picked up a plain white tees in the baby & toddler section at Target for $5 each.

Ribbon: Different widths, patterns and textures. I used 5 different ribbons on my shirt(s). Leftovers from previous projects work great since you don’t need much.

Fabric: And you don’t need much of it.  I used brown minky fabric, but it lost it’s bumps when I ironed it onto the shirt.  Still cute, but probably not worth the added expense.

Turkey Body Template: You can draw one yourself, or just download the convenient printable version from The Cottage Home.

Chalk or Fabric Pen: To trace your turkey onto the back of your fabric

Steam-a-Seam or similar product

Scissors

Iron

Glue Gun (or fabric glue)

Bottle of wine

Directions:

Start by cutting out your turkey body template.  Cut a square of fabric and a square of Steam-a-Seam large enough for your turkey body.  I actually wound up cutting the pieces separately rather than stacked as shown in the picture.  If they’re not the EXACT same size, that’s okay, but they should at least be close to the same size and shape.  Very close.

You can set the Steam-a-Seam aside for now and start working on your ribbon.  Decide how you want the ribbon laid out in advance.  Play around with alternating the colors.  You’ll need about 7 strips of the wider ribbon – the widest I used was 7/8″ – and 6 strips of smaller ribbon (3/8″).  I cut the ribbon into about 5″ long strips and ended up trimming them along the way.

Now, grab your turkey body, flip it over so that the back is facing up and start assembling and applying your ribbon with hot glue or fabric glue. Put a teen tiny smidge of glue at the bottom (back) of your ribbon.  Just enough to hold it together but not so much that it will get lumpy when it dries.

Next, make a loop and secure the end where you applied your teeny tiny smidge of glue.

Now put another teeny tiny smidge of glue on the bottom front of the ribbon loop where you’ll attach it to the turkey body and press the ribbon to the fabric.  Repeat this with the rest of your ribbon.  I alternate wide ribbon with skinny ribbon and had the colors mirroring each other on either side.

Remember that Steam-a-Seam you cut out with your turkey body?  Once all of those ribbon loops are attached, grab the Steam-a-Seam cut out, your t-shirt & your turkey body and head over to the ironing board.

Peel the translucent paper and the paper backing from your Steam-a-Seam. You should be able to see through it now.  Line it up on the back side of your ribbon-covered turkey body. Just place it right on top of all of those ribbon ends.   Flip both pieces over and position them onto your t-shirt.

Put a wash-cloth over your turkey body (I did this to save the bumps in my minky fabric.  It didn’t work.) and place the hot iron over the whole pile. You want to concentrate the iron’s heat on the middle where your adhesive is, and not on the sides where you could (and will!) flatten your pretty ribbon loops.

Aaannndddd…VOILA! You have your very own ribbon turkey shirt.

You can snip a little triangle  of orange ribbon or felt and attach a nose with hot glue.  You could sew on tiny buttons for eyes. Or you could just make a few stitches of contrasting fabric for the eyes.  Or, you know, go abstract (read: lazy) like me and don’t make any eyes at all.

For two shirts this project cost under $20!  And that included having to buy fabric and ribbon, which I’m sure a lot of you crafty types have hanging around the house. You may even have a plain white tee (or black, brown, pink, purple, etc.)  lying around the house too.

This shirt is 4-year-old approved.

If you make this shirt, I would love to see it! Please email me through the contact page, or link back from your project page.
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