Embroidered Swirly Christmas Tree

A Free Embroidery Tutorial

Sometimes creativity needs a kick start or a reboot. That is what embroidery is for me. I love the colors and the motion of sewing in and out of the fabric. It is an art that makes you go slow and think through the creative process. If I am drawing blanks when it comes to crocheting or knitting I always turn to embroidery. It is just a slightly different medium to give my brain a rest and think on different things.

I made a few of these last year during my Christmas break. It was to late in the season to blog about them, so I have been holding on to them until now to share them with you. These trees were a fun way to express my creativity. There was no right or wrong, I just let the curls make their own rules.

Tutorial 

To start I marked my fabric where I wanted to add the buttons. I made a long triangle and then I staggered where I would put the buttons on the tree.

After that I rough sketched where the swirls would go. (It might be better to put the buttons on first then add the sketch of swirls). 

I put the fabric in the hoop and stretched it tight and added the buttons using 3 strands the silver thread. I made 6 long stitches through the button holes and then put 2 stitches over each of the 6 long stitches.

I picked 6 to 7 colors and just went to town with the stem stitch all around the tree. I started at the bottom and worked my way up. I tried to work it so that one color never touched itself, and that the swirls went across the whole tree at some points.

The point is to have fun and to just let the stitches speak for themselves.

As you go along you can go back to the empty spaces and fill them in with other colors.

What colors would you make your trees?

What do you like to do to express your creativity? I'd love to know in the comments. 

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Finding Inspiration In Nature

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Don't you love all the flowers coming up. The Peonies down the street make me swoon, my favorite tiger lilies bloomed at the church next to us, and maybe the best thing is that the Black Eyed Susan's have popped up in my yard. I just could not resist stitching them up.

I might have to take more pictures as their seeds come in and stitch them up with lots and lots of french knots in the middle.

For now I want to take you through the steps of what I did to make this necklace happen. By the way, it is my daughter's last day of school tomorrow, and this beautiful necklace is going to her teacher, who has called my daughter Sunshine a few times. I thought this would be the perfect gift to remind her of the sunshine in her life.

First I drew out the rough design of what I wanted with a heat sensitive pen

Then I added the center stitches. I went with straight stitches, starting in the middle and working my way outwards. Starting with the light color first.

I worked 1 layer of woven picot petals equally around the center.

After the 8 petals, I went back through and filled in 6 more woven picot petals between the first set of petals.

I made 2 more woven picot petals in green for leaves. Then I chose 3 colors of green and filled in the background with the fishtail stitch and long stitches at random. When I was happy with the back ground I tacked down some of the picot petals in the positions that I wanted then to stay.

I hope you have found some inspiration to get outside and find wonders to stitch and treasure.

 

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If you follow me on Instagram, then you have already seen this project in formation. I wanting to share it with everyone else and add a little template for it. For the template I drew it out took a picture of it and then edited it and put it into a pdf. I have it originally drawn and in the transverse.

I started by drawing it out on a note book. When I was happy with it I copied it on to the fabric using a heat sensitive pen.

For all the the lettering I used the stem stitch and I filled in with long stitches in the thicker sections.

For the flowers I used stem stitches for the stems. I added lazy daisy stitches in yellow for the yellow blossoms. I added a dark green stem on top and added blue french knots to that stem. I also added long green grass accent. 

I framed it in a frame matted to fit a 5 by 7 pictures. 

Here is where you can find the Template. It should print out to fit in a 5 by 7 frame.

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A Free Embroidery Tutorial

I have another little project to share with you. I also have a crochet project that is getting closer to being ready to go up on the blog. But first the book mark.

This is a great project for when you need a quick gift for some one. It shows off your embroidery skills and shows that you care enough to spend the time to make something by hand.

Book Mark

Finished Size:3in by 7 in.
Item Needed 

• Fabric 
• felt or interfacing to put in between the fabric pieces
• embroidery floss
• embroidery needle 
• pinking shears
• embroidery hoop

 Start by drawing a simple pattern that will fit in a 3 by 7 inch space.

 Take the fabric out of the hoop. Add the interfacing and other piece of fabric stacking it with fabric facing up, interfacing, and fabric facing down. Cut the stack so that it measures 3 by 7 and with the embroidery picture centered.

Add a chain stitch around the outside edges of the book mark.
Tip: Start with your tail in between your layer of fabrics.

Finish off by trimming the book mark with pinking shears.

Now Go, and enjoy a good book.

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