I’ve mentioned on here before about my affinity for embroidery, and I can not express enough the importance of quality thread. If you’ve learned nothing of our time together, remember this: beware bulk bags of embroidery thread that seem too cheap to be true. They are BAGS OF FALSE HOPE AND LIES.
The colors are nice and all, but the thread itself begins to unravel after the first few passes through the fabric, leaving you with lumpy, knotted, uneven stitches that you have to unpick and redo. It also has a habit of just falling right out of the eye of the needle unprovoked. It’s simply garbage, but I don’t like to waste anything by throwing it out, even if I’d be doing both of us a favor.
Anyway, as with many scraps that make it to December, these will be used in making some ornaments!
I went on Pinterest, like ya do, to get some inspiration, and was INSTANTLY overwhelmed with options, each more beautiful and complicated than the last. This is a dangerous territory to be in for too long, as lurking behind each passing click of the mouse is the impending sense that this is all too much work, and it probably won’t turn out nice anyway. I suggest you get in and get out as quickly as if it were being fumigated.
To keep things simple, I started with just a humble circle. It’s timeless and hard to mess up, since you can use a jar lid to pattern it out. With it came my greatest life hack to date (maybe second greatest, after using Mio water enhancer to flavor cakes): JUST DO ONE THING!
It’s so stupidly simple, I don’t know why it never occured to me before. Just do one thing! Anyone can do ONE thing! What I mean by this is, rather than thinking it has to come out a certain perfect way, why don’t I just challenge myself to only make one snowflake. If after that, I want to add more, I only add one thing, like filling in the holes in the snowflake with another color. Each step is complete, with no need to go any further. I have fulfilled my end of the bargain with myself. Anything else is just bonus!
Back to the circle. Cut two so you have a front and back.
I agreed with myself that I would only have to embroider one side. As any crafter knows, you both love and loathe the process, because often times, we bite off more than we can chew. I wanted to keep this project as frustration-free as possible, since I have less time to craft these days. I’m forever making lesson plans for school, and then filming the lessons for everyone that doesn’t show up to the live class, essentially, doubling my workload. You can see some of those lessons here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnxXIwN9FkYI_c_3FgguKOw
So step 1 was to mark out where I wanted the arms of the snowflake to go. Then, I did some Lazy Daisy stitches, like this:
I was on such a roll with my “just do one thing” mantra that I didn’t take many process shots of the embroidery itself, but if you’re curious, it went from yellow Lazy Daisies, to pink running stitches, to blue french knots. Here’s how:
When I was satisfied that I’d done 3 “just one things,” I whip-stitched the front and back together with more of the pink thread. Here’s a whip stitch:
Now to give the ornament some dimension. I intended to spend $0 or less on this project, since it’s only going to be used once a year. The nice thing about felt is that it holds its structure well, even when you stuff it with literal trash, which is what I did! The scraps from the cut felt and the chopped off tails of embroidery thread were stuffed into the trash pocket, and no brag, but I didn’t have to walk to the trash can ONCE. It all went in.
Then all you have to do is hide your crimes by sealing it all up, and adding a little strip of ribbon or yarn so it can hang on the tree.
Now she’s ready for the tree!
Having done one and feeling accomplished, I decided to go a little bolder on the next one. I did a woven wheel stitch to make the flower, a chain stitch along the center, and a blanket stitch to close up the edges. Those look like these:
Remember that chintzy bulk bag of embroidery thread I was ranting about earlier? It’s not useful as its intended purpose, but it makes great filler!
Before I ran out of steam for the night, I made one more slightly more complicated ornament. I can’t overstate this enough, just focusing on one step at a time, rather than thinking about the big picture, is so motivating. I just check in with myself after each step and see if I want to keep going. If I do, I do, and if I don’t, I take a break. Try it if you haven’t!
So here’s the final piece. It’s kind of the sampler quilt of the group, I used a bunch of colors, and just let the thread determine how it was gonna come out. I think she holds her own on the tree.
So that’s it! I’m thinking of making some more ornaments, maybe some out of scrap fabric instead of felt next time, or maybe combining felt to make more detailed pictures. If I do, you’ll be the first to know.
Happy Holidays and a Better New Year!
~Madeleine
Moonflower DIY 