DIY: Felt Flower

My supplies

Some days I find myself spending hours browsing through my Reader subscriptions and by the time I've gotten through all of them I feel like like an under creative, impotent artist. It's like being in middle school again and I'm standing in the high school hallway; un-noticed, small, lack luster and plain uncool.

I've always wanted to try my hand at the beautiful fabric flowers I see all over the net but they always seemed so complicated. So today, with two giant cups of frantic energy (coffee) in my system, I happened upon this tutorial and giveaway at Grosgrain. The only thing I had to do was cut petal shapes out of fabric and use a hot glue gun. With new found confidence I said out loud, to the sleeping dog, "I can do that!"

I immediately rummaged through the "box of coolness," that my husband wonders why I keep, and found some black recycled felt from a 10 min project I did for him a few months ago (see below).

My "office." Underneath the desk to the left is the Box of Coolness.

This is my treasure box of cool sparkly and shinny things I inherited at an old job from the old trashed skating costumes of the Broadmoor Skating Club.

When your husband is a military pilot he'll collect a million patches and pins and want to display them all on his "I love me wall." Covering a cork board with felt is a good way to contain the madness.

Rather than use the printable templates from the tutorial I just made my own. With felt petals in hand and glue gun at the ready I used the glue and fold method in the tutorial to get my flower shape. Found a nice fancy, vintage bead-thing for the center, added some black ribbon and a bobby pin to the back and Viola! My finished hair flower!

It's tough taking pictures of your own head!

This was super easy and I love the result!!

NEW Vintage Style Save the Date Postcards

One of my favorite classes in college was print making and since then I've always dreamed of someday owning my own letterpress and silk screen studio (not for t-shirts, mind you).

When I heard of this book, The Handy Book of Artistic Printing I ordered it immediately. Upon its arrival I was instantly inspired by its contents: the diverse layouts, the complex and minute details, and the color palettes. I spent days sketching and flagging pages and when I finally sat down to the computer this postcard design came to life.

Front

Back

While directly inspired by a layout within the book, I now feel I have a better grasp of "how" to translate these vintage designs to modern stationery and create designs all my own. So look out for more awesomeness to pop up in the shop!