Got another great tutorial sent in by one of the readers. I love this idea of little felt monsters. They are perfect for making and hanging up on the wall of your kids room. But what I love about these the most is that you could have your child draw their own monsters and they can feature them in their rooms. Step by step instructions can be found on the Art, Adventures and Toddler blog.

Fall is right around the corner and these are a great way to celebrate and decorate for the autumn season. These are great for both outside and inside use. For people who have parties outside, these are great decorations.

Materials Needed:

Large balloon
Tape
Vegetable oil
Cheesecloth
Fire retardant
Water-and-glue mixture (1 part white glue to 1 part water)
Brown or green tissue paper
Scissors
Foam brush
Brown or green felt
Hot-glue gun and hot-glue sticks
Utility lampshade
Bulb socket with brown cord
Fluorescent light bulb
Leaf Template (click on the link for the template that I found when I did this craft)
Pencil
Screw punch
Floral wire

Instructions:

1. Blow up the balloon and tie. Tape the tie flat on the balloon — this will be the point of the acorn. Grease the balloon with vegetable oil so the glue won’t stick to the balloon.

2. Spray cheesecloth with fire retardant and allow to dry. Stretch treated cheesecloth over balloon and saturate cloth with water/glue mixture. Let dry.

3. Cut tissue paper into 2-inch-wide triangular strips. Brush water-and-glue mixture onto balloon with a foam brush, place a strip of tissue paper on the balloon (with triangle point at tip), and brush mixture over the strip. Repeat to create a layer of strips all over balloon. Allow the layer to dry and repeat, covering entire balloon with 3 to 4 layers. Allow layers to dry overnight.

4. Poke a hole on the rounded end of the balloon and allow the balloon to deflate. Remove the balloon. Trim excess tissue paper.

5. Cut 2-inch squares from felt and turn them on point so they are diamonds. Hot-glue the felt diamonds onto a utility lampshade, starting at the bottom rim of shade. Cover rim by folding diamonds over edge.

6. Overlap diamonds to cover the rest of the lampshade, using a dab of hot glue in the center of each to attach. Cut vent holes in the remaining felt pieces to align with the vent holes on the top of lampshade.

7. Wrap 1/2-inch strips of felt around a brown bulb socket cord, attaching with dabs of hot glue. To create little branch knobs, roll a strip of felt into a spiral and glue to cord.
Note: Felt can also be sprayed with fire retardant.

8. Screw in fluorescent light bulb.

9. Trace the leaf template onto felt. Cut out leaf shapes. Make holes with a screw punch as marked on the template. Weave floral wire through the holes of each leaf and secure with a smidgen of glue at ends. Attach leaves to cord with hot glue.

An “ear of corn” bookmark is a fun project to make and give. It is a perfect bookmark for those that have to mark a few succeding pages since the paper clip base is flexible can be adjusted. A great gift to give to students and teachers!

Hi! It’s my first time to write a tutorial so please bear with me. Do leave me a comment here or at my blog if you have any suggestions/questions about this tutorial. Thank you!

I whipped these up for my son when he was tiny still, with the intention of making more for friends as they had their kids. Though I actually made my own pattern, which I`ll describe below, you could also just download and print this one.

You`ll need two colors of felt for this project, a small piece of Velcro and embroidery thread in a complimentary color (though I`ve also used bright yellow with dark blue with great results).

Making Your Own Pattern

It`s really not that difficult, if you have a baby on hand, to make up your own pattern. Basically, you`ll need to trace around the baby`s foot and then add half an inch all round, smoothing it out until you have something that looks like a lopsided egg, with the wide part being the toe area. This is your sole. You`ll need  to cut two from the felt.

That`s the easy bit. Next, take a string and measure around the entire perimeter of the sole. Add a half inch or so and cut the string. This will help you create your main shoe pattern. Lay the string on a piece of paper, curving it into a U shape. When you have a shape that pleases you, trace it with a pen and then mark up 1.5″ and draw another U. In the bottom of the curve, you`ll need to create the tongue of the shoe, which will be about 2 inches long. At this point, you should have something that roughly resembles this:

Decorating

Cut two of these shoe parts out of the felt, as well. You can cut your design out of contrasting felt. I used stars, but you could easily make this a heart or fish, car, just about any simple design you can think of.

Stitch the design onto the center of the toe, leaving room for the embroidered words.

To make sure your words turn out right, it`s a good idea to write them in disappearing ink on the felt before stitching. I didn`t do this for these shoes and you can see how that worked out! Use a simple backstitch to embroider the words. You could also embroider little flowers or anything your heart desires.

Construction

Start at the toe and pin the top part of the shoe to the sole, all the way around. The seam will be facing outwards, like in the top picture. Make sure you pin the heel seam, as well, since this tends to pull apart as you go.

Using a blanket stitch, stitch the top of the shoe to the sole, then up the heel. Presto, a shoe! Now you just need to fold over the tongue and sew in place with an X to form the loop in front. Use the blanket stitch to decorate and finish the raw edges.

For the fastener, simply cut two strips of felt, 3 inches by half an inch and use the blanket stitche to finish. Sew to the side of the shoe that will face in, thread through the tongue loop. Sew the Velcro to the appropriate places on the fastener and the shoe and you`ve got a soft little bootie for any baby.

If you`re interested in turning your crafts into a business, check out my blog for tips and ideas.

Who doesn’t love graham crackers?

Well, I do. I use them all the time for pie crusts, quick breading on chicken cutlets – goes great with a peanut sauce , and for quick snacks (grahams and cream cheese – like a mini cheesecake). They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery – so here is my imitation of the unsung hero in my kitchen:

The Graham Cracker.

You will need:

felt in 2 colors – cracker brown and a pink of your choice for cheeks (I prefer all wool felt not the poly-acrylic craft felt. The wool holds together better, the p-a pulls apart very easily, but use what you have. )

cotton embroidery floss in 3 colors – cracker brown, pink to match the cheeks and black for details

sharp scissors, pins, sharp embroidery needle and  a bit of patience

Cut out four rectangles from the brown felt, I used an actual graham cracker as a template and it measured 5″ by 2.5″. Cut eight circles for the cheeks from the pink felt at about .25″ in diameter. I used the cap of a pen for a template for the circles.

Fold one of the rectangles in half width-wise and mark this with pins. Place two cheeks in each square and pin in place. Use your pink embroidery floss and stitch each cheek in place using blanket stitch. Each strand of embroidery floss is made up of six individual threads, I only used three for the cheeks.

Now using only two strands of the black floss add some facial features, eyes,  mouth, noses if you please.

I used a comics “how to draw” book for inspiration on the eyes and mouths, but use your imagination Repeat this process on a second rectangle.

Once these two pieces are finished set them aside. On the third and fourth rectangles mark your middle with pins, just the same as with the first two, and beginning in the very center place a running stitch up the lengthwise center to the edge. This divides the half into the familiar quarters. Now we’ll work french knots to simulate the impressions in a real graham cracker. I use a three wrap french knot, but do what you are comfortable with.

Work four evenly space knots about .25″ away from the running stitch. Work three more knots .25″ over and staggered from the first four and then repeat the first four along the outside edge.

Repeat on the other side of that square, turn the piece, add another running stitch and repeat the french knots. Work the same steps on the fourth rectangle.

Pin one french knotted rectangle to one with faces, wrong sides together, and place a running stitch along the width-wise center. Now work a blanket stitch around all four sides and your goofy graham is done!

You could easly make some sassy saltines, cheesy cheez-itzs or any of your favorite crackers. 

Toots