Hello, hello! It's so hard to believe that it's officially Spring now :) It still feels very much like Winter here, but the days are slowly getting longer and Mr. Sunshine is happily making more appearances LOL! I've been under the weather on and off since Christmas, so although I had Big Plans to start my Sampler of Samples in January, things have not exactly gone as expected. I'm still thinking about the SOS though!
In the meantime, I've been having a lot of fun experimenting with embellishing felt Easter Eggs with sparkly sequins and beads, and a bit of embroidery too. This is a super easy technique, so if you're looking to quickly whip up some Eastertide Cheer before the Holiday next week, you might want to try this out yourself:
Here are the four Eggs I've made so far! The wonky little pink one on the left was my first attempt, and I should really have cut it up but I didn't have the heart. The felt wouldn't have been reuseable anyway, because the center daisy was so thickly stitched, so now it's serving me as a cheerful festive pincushion :)
Although I measured the flower petal placement, the leaves and the stripes, nothing turned out quite right. I had high hopes for the Herringbone Stitch I attempted at the very top, but it turned out a bit oddly. The daisy is made the same as those in my Floral Umbrella. My favourite part is this interlaced diamond stitch thing I made up:
A quick word about the supplies I used: Unfortunately, I couldn't find any of that magical wool felt locally, so I used dollar store felt. Some colours were thicker than others, with the lavender being the plushest (and therefore easiest to work with) and the dark purple being the thinnest. But I think it worked fine for these small projects.
The thread I used for stitching, the Buttonhole Stitch edging and the Twisted Cording hanging loops is craft thread by Loops & Threads. It's the Michaels brand, and I'll be doing a Review in future. The bright colours are prefect for this time of year!
The pretty pastel sequins are from a container of all kinds of mixed colours and shapes from my Stitchy Guru Mother's stash. They've been around ever since I can remember - they're likely older than I am LOL! It's nice to finally find a way to use them :) The bright colours are from various dollar store assortments - my advice is that if you find some you really like, buy extra because sometimes sequins aren't coloured or punched out right. Look for shapes you can layer, like I did here:
All the sequins are attached with seedbeads. For the lavender Eggs, I used a pretty iridescent white but for the brighter violet Egg, I used silver-lined clear for extra sparkle :) To keep the attachment subtle, I used the quilter's friend, Invisible Thread, but you could use fishing line, or a thread that matches the base of the Egg.
You can see the silver Toho seedbeads I used here; they are super bright and sparkly! For the center band of this Egg, I sewed down a bit of pretty trim. It's a silver metallic lattice threaded with semi-transparent iridescent plastic bands with a greeny-purple flash of colour that is really pretty in person. It's from an assorted all-silver card I bought on sale, for 50 cents a card, at Michaels after Christmas:
These are the different colours I bought, they're called "Midnight Jewel". I was drawn to the metallic rickrack originally, but the rest of the trims are interesting too.
My very favourite Easter Egg is this one, which is my first ever attempt at Ribbon Embroidery! The center flower is a Spiderweb Rose, and I used a thin polyester ribbon in pink and green from WalMart. They were just 50 cents a spool, so it's an economical way to experiment! I really had fun stitching this one - it's a LOT easier than it looks; the leaves are only Lazy Daisies, and the "buds" are French Knots:
I was going to add sequins to this one too, but after I stitched the Rose, I wanted something with a little more texture to match the raised flower:
So I ruched some of the pink ribbon, adding some pretty plastic pink pearls at regular intervals. I used a sewing thread to match the ribbon for this, and it worked out great! I ruched each length as one long stripe and then couched it down across the Egg to secure it. I think this would make a really nice edging too, for something special!
So there you have it! My Eggstravagantic Experiments so far LOL :) I have another lavender felt Egg cut out, so I'll try to finish that up over the weekend. These could easily be adapted to whatever sparklies, beads and other pretties you have around!
I think that about covers the whole process. Oh, to get the shape, I folded a piece of paper in half and cut the half-oval out, Valentine Heart style, and then when I was happy with it I made a cardstock template to use with the felt. You could also print off a blank Egg shape to use - there are tons, like this one from a garland tutorial, online.
If you do decide to make your own Embroidered Easter Eggs, I'd love to see them :)
Another quick project would be the Chicken Scratch Easter Egg I shared last year:
Please note that you do NOT have to create an account to download the freebie; just "x" out of the New to Dropbox screen, and then you can view and download the .PDF like normal. If you have any trouble, just e-mail me (my address is in the sidebar, under the pretty postage stamps). Enjoy, and Have a Very Happy Easter!!!
