Hand Embroidery Archives - Lavender on Main

Maybe you’re looking to create something new and fresh with your embroidery, or possibly you love needle felting but want to up it’s visually interesting factor, or possibly you’re just looking for needle felting ideas – either way, this post is perfect for you!

So, a little back story, I’ve been hand embroidering for years now, likely more than 5 at this point, though I haven’t kept track specifically, but long enough that I’ve tried just about everything you can do with embroidery. And one of those fun things I’ve tried is incorporating needle felting ideas into my embroidery projects.

What is exactly is needle felting?

So needle felting is the act of pushing into felt, or linen fabric, a barbed needle specifically for needle felting, using wool roving or batting, to create a work of art. It really is that easy. It takes practice like anything but it came fairly intuitively to me and I think it could for you as well, especially if you’ve already been creating hand embroidery designs or are a creative person in general.

Needle Felting Ideas

Let’s take a look at what I did with my piece.

My inspiration was a flowering field with mountains off in the distance.

I cut a 5×7 piece of felt – make sure it’s the good quality craft felt and not the stiff felt, that won’t work with needle felting.

I grabbed a frame that would fit the final piece.

I gathered my supplies:

needle felting pad

needle felting needles

wool roving or batting in the colors of your choice

felt pieces to needle felt onto

a pen or heat erasable pen for drafting the design on the felt

Here are some quick and handy links to some needle felting supplies you might want to purchase.

Needle felting pad

Needle Felting Roving

Needle Felting Needles

This is a good option for felt though I typically buy my felt via Etsy.

With this piece I kept it inside the embroidery hoop and used tiny beads in the grass and messy embroidery French knots in the sky to represent clouds. I wish I’d have gotten better pictures of the final product after it was done but I forgot to before it went to its home.

As you can see the sky is the limit! Use your imagination and go wild with the two mediums of needle felting and hand embroidery.

Here are some books that might be of interest to you!

In Closing:

Working with needle felting really is quite a natural blend with hand embroidery. I think you could really do a lot of fun stuff when using your imagination!

And below are two more examples of what I’ve done using wool roving and embroidery floss.

PIN THIS POST FOR LATER READING

Welcome to Lavender on Main, a fun DIY hand embroidery, and other fiber arts, craft blog. I’m so happy you’re here. Today marks the very first DIY tutorial on the blog and I’m so stoked to share with you how to make these beautiful hand-embroidered bookmarks!

But first, have you signed up for the Get Crafty newsletter? It’s my weekly crafty newsletter and where you’ll be notified of new projects, patterns, and tutorials. Sign up here.

SUPPLIES

20mm bookmark blanks. I buy mine from this store on Etsy. (Please note, there are other sizes in her shop. This tutorial is using the 20mm circle blanks.)

3/4 inch paper punch OR a 20mm cabochon that you can trace on watercolor color and cut out with scissors. You can find the paper punch here on Etsy at this store, or search on Etsy or Amazon for other sellers.

e6000 glue which you can find at any craft store.

Optional: wooden clothespin holders.

A small eyed needle

DMC Floss, colors of your choosing

Fabric color of your choice. I use cotton or a linen blend.

Small embroidery hoop

Embroidery scissors

Air or water soluble markers

Watercolor paper or thick card stock paper.

Your own embroidery design. For something this small think small flower design, plants, cacti, small landscape, an initial… things of that nature.

STEP-BY-STEP DIRECTIONS

Step One: Get your paper punch and punch the circle out of watercolor paper or a thick card stock paper. This will be the perfect size to fit in the bookmark with just enough room around it to account for the fabric that will fit around the paper and be glued to the blank.

Alternative to paper punch: although a paper punch is much easier than this method, this method will work fine if you’d like to cut costs and not pay for a paper punch. You’ll order a 20mm cabochon, trace around the cab onto paper, then with small sharp scissors you’ll cut around the circle. This may take some practice at first to cut the circle perfectly but you’ll get it after awhile.

Step Two: Get the circle you just cut out and trace around it with the water or air soluble marker onto your hooped fabric. This will be the template on the fabric so you know where to stitch and where to cut around the fabric when the design is complete.

Step Three: Draw your design on the inside of the circle. If you don’t need to draw it, and can just eyeball your design without a drawn template, you can skip this step. Even when I’m doing something a bit abstract, or easy, I still like to draw something to help guide me. I use a pen or pencil to do this step since I’ll cover that all up with the floss.

Step Four: Get your needle, thread it with your floss of choice, and stitch your design. Once you’re done stitching the design you’ll want to follow the rest of the steps…

Step Five: You’ll want to remove the fabric from the hoop, and carefully cut roughly a half of an inch around the stitched design. If you cut too much, the fabric will bunch up and be hard to lay flat in the bookmark, and if you cut too little, you won’t be able to do the running stitch around it to cinch it up around the paper.

Step Six: Do a running stitch around the fabrics edge, get your paper you cut out, place it inside the fabric, take the needle you still have attached to your thread and pull it tight around the paper but not so tight that it warps the paper.

Step Seven: Take the embroidered piece that is now a nice circle, put a dab of e6000 glue on the bookmark blank, and lay the fabric down onto the glue. Push the embroidered piece firmly down, making sure it’s centered how you need it, and use a clothespin to hold it together for 30 minutes to an hour to make sure it won’t move. If you don’t have a clothes pin, you can put a heavy book on top of the bookmark to hold it in place.

These hand embroidered bookmarks would make wonderful gifts! They’re unique and the hand-made nature of them add to their charm and value. I can see any reader/book lover enjoying these!

If you try this project, I’d love to see your final result. And if you have any questions along the way, feel free to contact me as I’m happy to help as best I can.

IN DEPTH TUTORIAL WITH VIDEO

I’ll be putting together a paid pattern for this project soon with a couple of designs, a video walking you through the steps, and more pictures. If you’re interested in that, sign up for my free newsletter to be notified when that will be available.

PIN FOR LATER

Needle Felting Ideas: Including Hand Embroidery

Needle Felting Ideas

DIY Hand-Embroidered Bookmarks

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