Bunny Ear Teether Tutorial and Pattern

Adorable bunny ears are the perfect Easter DIY for the little one’s in your life. These little ear teethers are a boutique staple and always a hit at baby showers.  You will need a sewing machine but have no fear novice sewers, this one is extremely simple to master.  The “ears” can be slipped off for washing or switched out based on mood. Customize the fabric to your nursery theme or baby shower. I backed these guys in a minky dot for some fun soft texture but a terry cloth would make a great choice for hard core teethers. The addition of crinkle material makes these ears extra fun. Because what baby doesn’t go crazy for crinkle?

You will need:

1/8 yard fabric of choice

1/8 yard backing of choice, minky or terry cloth add a fun texture.

All natural wood teething ring (these rings are solid and the wood won’t splinter)

Sewing machine

Pattern to make bunny ear teether (At the end of post)

Crinkle Material for baby toys (optional) Crinkle Material 

Cut

Cut out ear pattern on fold from fabric of your choice.

Place the fabrics together with the printed (front) sides facing each other.

Pin to backing and roughly cut around in a rectangle. Minky and other silky fabrics shift it’s easier to just sew down and then cut.

How to add crinkle material to  your handmade baby toy.

Adding crinkle to your baby toy is super easy. Just place the toy crinkle on top of one side of the project and then sew. (see pink chevron print above) The crinkle material will be in the center when turned.

AFC’s crinkle is formulated to be washer/ dryer and iron safe so treat as you would normally no special requirements.

Sew pieces together leaving around 1/4″ from your stitch to the edge of the fabric. Leave at least 1″ near the center of one side to turn rightside out.

Cut off extra backing fabric and trim off the unsewn part of the ear tip.

Turn.  Use a chopstick or unsharpened pencil to help you get the ear tips.

Tuck the raw pieces of the opening together, pin if needed and sew shut.

Iron along the edges only (this helps preserve the minky bumps) and top stitch around the ears one more time.

That’s it! Now to add the teething ring to your brand new rabbit ear teether.

How to attach to teething ring

1. Fold back sides together and pull the center into the ring to make a loop.
2. Pull the ears through the loop slowly adjusting to keep the print facing forward as needed.
3. Tug on the ears to tighten.

Happy Crafting!

~Andie

Bunny Ear Pattern PDF: BunnyEarsPattern

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Easy Sew- DIY Cowrie Shell Bracelet

These cowrie shell inspired felt bracelets add a touch of the tropics to your child’s summer crafting. Easy to make these can be made start to finish by a beginning sewer with minimal effort. To make sure these beauties were totally doable for the tween crafter I enlisted the help of my 10 year old niece Ruby.

And they turned out fabulously!

You will need: 

9″ x 1.5″ Bracelet felt color – Ruby used Chocolate, Lavender, and Embossed  felt.

6″ x 6″ Off white felt/ shell color,  she used Linen.

3/4″ Button per bracelet – she used  wood grain buttons

Brown thread

Scissors

Sewing needle

Felt glue

Clothes Pins

Packing tape- Optional

Loosely cut around the bracelet template and try on to get it close to the right size. It will need to overlap so the button works.

Trim the template and tape or pin it down to the felt and cut out.

Cut out 4 shell shapes per bracelet cut the edges of these shapes with pinking shears, scallop scissors or just cut small triangles out along the edges with regular scissors.

Mark where the button should go and sew down with criss crossing stitches.

Mark the correct spot for the button-hole and carefully fold over the felt and cut. Cut less than you need to, you can always make it bigger.

When you’re done your bracelet should button up!

Lay down the shell shapes and sew along the middles with a simple running stitch.

To make the shells curl place small dots of felt glue fold over and clip clothes pins to hold them until dry…about 15 minutes. Then remove the clips and rock those babies!

Kids cowrie shell bracelet template:

 

Happy Crafting!

Ruby & Andie

D.I.Y Baby Kraken and Ship Toy

The Norse legend of the Kraken tells of enormous sea monsters attacking sea vessels of the coast of Norway and Greenland. The kraken once awoken from it’s sleep wraps it’s giant tentacles around anything it encounters, dragging entire ships and their crew to a watery grave in the deepest depths of the ocean before returning to it’s soulmn slumber.           But man their babies sure are cute!

Since no one has ever seen an actual Kraken I decided this version had one giant eye, a beak, a squid like head and an octopus like body.  These kraken babies are practicing fearsome ship attacks with their little shipwreck pull toy.

The finished felt kraken babies are 3″ tall and 3″ at the  base, their toy is 1.25″ long and 1.5″ from “wheel” base to mast. So these little guys come together pretty quickly.

You will need:

For Felt Kraken Baby

4″ x 9″ Felt scrap per kraken I used Skating Pond and Cactus *

3.5″ Felt square per kraken bottom, I used Ink and Cilantro

1″ black square felt for eye *

Tint scrap for beak I used Banana Cream Pie, and Beet

Kraken Template (at the end of this post)

A small amount of stuffing

White embroidery thread

Felt Glue

For Shipwreck Pull Toy

2″ x 4″ Scrap brown felt I used Doe *

Tiny amount of white felt for sails.

4 – 3/4″ buttons

Red embroidery thread

Felt Glue

* Matching Thread

Release the Kraken!

Sew down eye piece with black thread and accent with white embroidery thread body pieces as shown. Sew or glue kraken beak into place. If you use felt glue wait for it to dry around 30 minutes before continuing.

Sew along the kraken head as shown on the template using a tight running stitch. Make sure the body pieces don’t match up like mirrors you should have a higher leg on either side. Sew sides down to the legs, leave legs unsewn. Overcast titch the head edges together. Stuff felt kraken lightly. Cut sucker circles from scraps of felt that match your kraken and glue down as shown allow to dry 30 minutes before continuing.

Overcast stitch the kraken bottom to the stuffed body piece, add more stuffing as you go to fluff up the neck area so the feltie stands up straight. Twist the arms a few times and they will curl up a little.

Tiny Shipwreck Pull Toy

Freehand some sail shapes as shown above. For reference the larger one is 3/4″ inch at its longest point and the smaller is 1/4″ at it’s longest point, so these are very small. The goal is to look tattered so there’s really no way to mess up your felt sails.

Fold the mast piece over and stitch sails down to one side with a running stitch, stop on the area shown on the template. Knot.

Open up bottom of mast and sew the flaps to the base of the ship. I sewed mine off center so it would lay a little more haphazardly. Set aside.

Sew felt ship sides together along the front using an overcast stitch.

Sew back to short side in back with the wider part of the template facing upward. And repeat on opposite sides (pictures above are backwards, sorry.)

Curl the flap that that is over the top of the boat backward and secure with a few stitches.

Place bottom with mast into the ships hull and stitch together with an overcast stitch.

Now that your felt boat is assembled cut some chunks out of it to make it look a little more distressed.

Glue button wheels in place with felt glue or hot glue.

Knot embroidery thread and sew through the ship, knot and cut to make pull string.

Print kraken template at full size

Get to kraken!

~Andie

 

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Sewing or Gluing Sequins To Felt- A Refresher

Do you love sequins?    Do you love felt?     Boy I know I do!

Combine the two and double up on the awesome!

Here’s how to sew down sequins.

Rows of Sequins:

Sequins: Hot Pink from American Felt and Craft

To sew down rows of sequins start by coming up the back of your piece with your threaded needle.

Slide your sequin down the thread.

Move needle behind your sequin.

Push needle through and come up one space in front of the sequin you just placed down.

Pull the needle through and thread the next sequin repeating the process.

Sewing down single sequins or sequins that are spaced further apart is also very easy.

Come up through the bottom of your piece. Slide sequin down thread.

Create a small stitch to hold half the sequin, repeat on the other side. These two stitches are enough to secure the sequin but without another sequin behind and in front of it like the ones above the sequin is more likely to catch on items. You can also hold it down with an even four stitches but keep in mind  the more thread you use the less sparkle.

While we’re on the subject there is a right way and a wrong way to secure sequins to felt using felt glue.

Sequins: Grape Soda from American Felt and Craft

Felt is made up of small bits of fibers all tangled together. If you press the glue into the fibers it becomes trapped inside the fibers making the piece stiff but failing to properly secure the sequin to you piece for the long haul. If you press into the felt piece when gluing the sequins the bond will be stiff and brittle and the pieces are more likely to pop off.

Instead float the sequin on a thin pillow of felt glue as the moisture evaporates the sequin will become more even with the felt and the glue will dry clearly.

When your sequin dries it should look like this.

Happy Crafting!

~Andie

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