It’s Christmas! Well, Christmas in July, and Christmas means
decorations and presents.
Hoop art makes great decorations and is perfect for
gifting. Hoop Art can be as complicated or as simple as you wish and you don’t
even need to be able to sew to make one. The hoop I created above can be made
by sticking or stitching the pieces down or you could blend the two. Felt looks
equally good if you stick or stitch.
The Sizzix Bigz dies I used for this project are pictured
below.
I started by cutting out the pieces I needed for my 12”
embroidery hoop:
20 dark and 20 light green felt leaves
1 brown and 1 cream felt deer
1 set each of green and white felt stars
1 set of flower petals and centres in red and green felt
A strip of white fabric
Piece of dark blue fabric, to fit hoop
Embroidery hoop
Red felt to cut circles for berries
White felt to cut stars and circles for the deer’s eyes
Dies don’t always have to be used as they were first
designed. I didn’t have a tree die in the size or form I needed so I made mine
from stars. I trimmed off the side points of the star to make a triangle-like
shape. I did the same to the two other stars.
I used the same star die to cut white felt so I could tip my
trees with snow. I cut across the bottom of the white star in a wiggly line and
glued it over the same size green tree piece. I cut 2 more snow pieces to fit
the other 2 green tree pieces.
Place the fabric over the inner piece of the embroidery hoop
and push the outer hoop down over the inner. Tighten the screw on the hoop and tease
back the left-over fabric until the fabric is taut. If you want to stitch the
white fabric down it can be easier to wait until it’s in the hoop. If using
fabric glue, stick the white fabric down before placing in hoop.
I chose to cut the Sizzix leaf die out in 2 shades of green.
I glued the lighter green leaf stem behind the darker to create a sort of drop
shadow effect. That way you could see a more even appearance of the light green
poking out, under the dark green as the wreath builds up, giving some depth and
definition.
When creating the wreath, I found it easier to start
building up the wreath by finding the centre of the bottom half of the hoop and
placing the first leaf about a third of the way over that middle point.
Glue
down the leaf and place your second leaf down the same way but on the opposite
side.
If you keep going from side to side, overlapping the leaves, your wreath
should be evenly spaced.
Keep going till your leaves meet in the middle. Cut small
circles of red felt in roughly the same size and place on the wreath as berries.
Stick or stitch your main scene pieces down in the middle of
the hoop. I used a piece of hessian for the tree trunk and cut 3 stars from a
template in my stash. I used a silver metallic thread to embellish the stars
with some simple stitching.
I topped off the wreath with a big bow in red ribbon and
placed the flower I made from the Sizzix die pictured at the top of the post.
When finished turn the hoop over, trim back the excess
fabric and glue in place.
Merry Christmas in July, Happy Crafting!
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