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Full and Textured Fabric Flowers

 

We can never seem to have enough flowers in our house.  Or fabric.

So, to satisfy both things……..I made some new fabric flowers.  Kind of similar to these.

But easier and less uniform.  And much harder to mess up.

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They are a bit rugged.  And raw.  But I like that.

And they can be attached, clipped, sewn, or glued………..to almost anything.

But my first thought……..is always in the hair.  They just add the sweetest touch.

 

There’s something about the texture of the fabric.  It’s perfect.

(And yes, the edges are raw……but they’re made with a bunch of circles and this helps keep the fabric from fraying very much. 

But if it does fray a bit, it only adds to the charm.)

 

I’m even crazy about them on my littlest one’s head.  Sweet and munchy little thing.  Mmmmm…….

 

And just for fun…….here’s a zoom out of our photo shoot.  Yes, that’s her daddy, flirting with our sweet baby.

If he’s home, he makes the best assistant.  And he’s free labor. :)

Thanks baby girl.  You and your big sister wear your little flowers well.

Would you like to make a few fabric flowers?

To begin, decide on how big you want your flower to be.  My flower ended up measuring 2 1/4 inches across (diameter).

To make a flower that size, I cut out a circle that was 1 3/4 inches in diameter and used that as my circle pattern piece.

I cut some strips of fabric that were about 2 inches wide (just a bit wider than my red circle pattern piece)……

 

And then folded my strip again and again until I had several layers to cut through.

 

I then used my little red circle as a guide to cut through all of those layers.

 

Keep in mind, the circles don’t have to be perfect and can have uneven edges.  No biggee. (But if you’re going for perfection…..trace your circle piece on your fabric over and over again and then cut them all out.  And good luck!)

 

You should have a nice stack of circles (I used about 30 circles).  Then cut out one more circle (the same size) out of felt.

 

To begin, grab one of you fabric circles and grab it in the center from the bottom.

 

Then squish the outside of the circle towards you (the messier the better), while holding the center tip from behind.

 

Now place that messy little scrunched up piece on top of the felt circle, with the raw edges facing outward.  Allow the edges to overlap about a 1/4 inch.  Sew the tip in place, down to the felt.

 

Now do the same thing with your second fabric circle, and place it under the presser foot and sew the tip in place, just like the first.  You want to place each scrunched up circle nice and snug next to the first, so that your flower will be nice and full.

 

Continue adding more and more circles, keeping the outer edges even, about a 1/4 inch over the felt circle edge…….until you complete the full circle.

 

Then start a new layer of scrunched circle on top of the first……but place them so that the edges aren’t out quite as far as the first.  This will help your flower look rounded as it gets smaller and smaller towards the center.

 

Continue around the circle with this layer, keeping the edges in slightly more towards the center.

Now depending on the size of your flower (how big your circles are, etc.) you may only need to sew 2 layers or you may need more.  But for this sized flower, I sewed on a 3rd layer.  And with this layer, I used a pin to help shove the tip in towards the center before sewing it down.  Try it, it may help you too.

This is how it looked after my 3 layers were sewn on.

To cover the center, I trimmed down 3 of my remaining fabric circles by about 1/3 of an inch, all the way around.

Then I scrunched them up the same way, and hand sewed each of those 3 scrunched up circles to the center.  This filled in the empty space nicely.

Make sure while going up and down with your needle, that you go between layers and don’t mess up any of the fullness of the outer edges.

And that completes the flower.  Feel free to trim off any wonky edges with some scissors……..and that’s it.

And here’s a view from the back.  If you want, you can cut out another circle of felt and glue it to the back of this, to hide the sewing.  But it just depends on how you’ll use the flower.

Now make more.  In lots of colors. 

And use them here, there, and everywhere.

(I have a project coming up, showing how else I used these little flowers.)

Ashley Johnston

Administrator at Make It & Love It
Ashley Johnston is a professional DIY costume maker, sewist, crafter, and owner of Make It & Love It. She is a mom of 5 and a wife to a very patient (with the craft clutter) husband. In case you’re wondering, she always chooses crafting/sewing/designing over mopping/dusting/wiping base boards……but bathrooms/laundry/full bellies are always attended to. Whew!

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Hi, I'm Ashley

Hi, I’m Ashley—the DIY-enthusiast behind this crazy blog!

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