Felt Flower Tutorial

I'm going to take you step by step through making your own felt flowers. A lot of women, like me, enjoy doing things themselves, and this project, while time consuming, is rather enjoyable, as you get to see something from start to finish, and get to relate your pride in that you did it yourself.

Here's what you'll need: Green and White felt, Scissors, Assorted Embroidery Floss, Needles, Fabric Marking Pen (designed for tailors and quilters, washable) and Assorted Buttons. All of these items can be picked up at Hancocks fabrics, or Jo-Anns fabrics.

White felt: Start by making marks on your fabric with the marker, in the general shape you want your flowers. I prefer a 5 leaf flower. Pictured on the left, you can use a guide for the center of your flower such as a coin, and branch the petals off of it. I draw mine out free-hand, but if you're not comfortable without a guide, the coin will do the trick!

Here is an example of how my flowers look. Make them in assorted sizes so they can be stacked for the finished product. Note: The flowers don't have to look perfect! Different sized petals can give them a very unique look.

Cut them out carefully along the cutting lines you made. But, if they don't look quite right, don't be afraid to trim them! Remember, there's more where that came from!

Green Felt: Use your marking pen on the green felt (note: you will have to draw your design onto the same spot a few times before the ink will show up well enough to use as a cutting guide). Make generous sized leaf shapes and cut them accordingly.

Here's what you have to work with so far. Select a smaller felt flower cut out, and thread your needle with a strand of embroidery floss (note: do not separate the threads in the embroidery floss).

I'm going to show you one of my favorite embroidery stitches, but if you know your stitches well enough, you can skip this part. Insert your needle through the back of the flower, and push the needle back through the same hole, only leaving a loop of thread in the front.  

Next, push your needle through the back of the flower again, about 1/4 of an inch higher than the first stitch. Slip the needle through the loop of thread, and pull gently to tighten it.

Then push your needle back through the second hole, on the other side of the loop so that your thread has created a second loop around the top of the first loop.

Repeat the process on all the other petals, and your result should look something like this.

Find another flower cut out, slightly larger than the first, and start embroidering it. Remember, only the edges of the larger one are going to be seen, so add the flare where it will show.

Running stitches are the best to use for the big flower. They show beautifully, and add some real fun to the whole flower.

Here's a photo of the large flower finished. I told you it was fun looking!

And it shows perfectly to give this elegant flower some personality.

Next you have your leaves. I really like the white on green, so we're sticking with it.

Just make a simple diagonal stitch...

Then a second, starting from the center of the first, and branching outward.

Your finished leaf should look like this! If not, oh well, sometimes you have to make it up as you go along!

To keep things simple, I did a running stitch on the second leaf. It keeps a nice homey look to the leaves, while still dressing it up a bit.

Next, put everything together! Lay down your leaves, face up, and stack the bottom and top flower, and top it with a button. Make sure the flowers and leaves are positioned in the spot you want them!

And finally, sew it all down. Make sure that your needle and thread go through ALL of the layers. Dont miss either of the leaves (which is the hard part), and dont let either of the flowers shift too much as you sew.

I hope you enjoyed the tutorial! And come back again soon for more Do It Yourself ideas!