Felt Play Mats Update

One of the Christmas gifts I am working on for all the kids (6 and under) in our family are handmade felt play mats. Each one is different, though some are based on a similar theme. For instance, there will be two Marvel play mats, two train mats and two dinosaur mats. However, the two train mats will be completely different because one is based on dinosaur train (there are pictures below) and the other will be based on Thomas the Train. The Marvel City felt play mat will be similar, with a road and three or four buildings each, but the buildings will be different colors and shapes (and they will each have a handful of our Marvel characters felt board pieces).

Not pictured (because they haven't been started yet) are Thomas the Train, Frozen, and Minnie Mouse inspired felt play mats. My goal for the Frozen play mat will be two-sided, with a winter land scene on one side and a dance hall on the other. The Minnie Mouse play mat will also hopefully be two-sided with a Minnie's Bowtique side and a garden side.

As for the felt play mats that are currently in the works and very nearly done, are the ones pictured below. Most of these are done, except for needing a secondary layer of felt sewn to the bottom. This will not only make the play mats more durable, but it will also hide the stitching on the bottom (and younger children may be curious enough to pull on them). I'll stick with earthy tones for the bottom layer.

Don't mind the unedited photos. :)

I really like these two play mats! I adore the little rocks! I wanted one to be more of a grassy forested area and the other to have some sandy hills.

Initially I was using green thread around the rocks to act as grass. But the effect wasn't exactly what I was hoping for.

I didn't want to unstitch them though, so I continued and added some cute French knots as tiny flowers.

It doesn't look terrible. And I love the little rocky path!

It was then that I decided to practice needle felting and added a few details... and some more French knot flowers!

And then I had a genius idea to use Lion Brand Fun Fur Yarn as grass! (So glad JoAnn's had it in stock!)

I personally think it looks great! I really wish I had it for the first play mat, but oh well. I now have it to add to the other play mats. 

I simply pinned it along the edge and used a whip stitch. I didn't stitch over the yarn though. I connected it by stitching straight through it. This way it can't be as easily pulled out.

I love it!

Then I decided to make some felt logs (and yes, I often just make stuff up as I go, as I don't usually start with a strict plan). I simply cut out dark brown and tan strips of felt and rolled them up. I used a pin to keep them in place. Some I needle felted together (surprisingly durable) and the others I stitched.

I even made a hollow log!

It was at this point that it was nearly bedtime for the kids and they used that as an excuse to suddenly need to play and swarmed me with their Safari Ltd. TOOB toys. These toys are the perfect size for felt play mats.

Still swarming...

Super swarmed. :)

But on that note... check out how lovely they look in their new home!

I added a cave with an open back (according to Bean, it's an escape exit) and a flowery meadow. I needle felted around the cave and added some grass and rocks. The flowery meadow is completely needle felted and so is that cute mossy white rock!

Here is the beginnings of a construction site felt play mat for my little nephew who loves trucks! The darker brown is where the packed earth is to form a road. There is also a hole at the bottom. I'll be adding rock mounds, brick piles and a half-built house to act as a truck garage.

So far I have added this grassy area and a few needle felted areas. You can't really tell, but the green circle in the upper left corner is actually a 3D bush. :)

See? I added stitched lines to the hole to make it actually look like a hole (I hope!) and grassy trim around the green patch.

On to the first of two Marvel City play mats... I added a road because many battles take place in the streets.

And a few buildings. I'll likely needle felt clouds and a sun (or sew some on). One special thing that I will add to this play mat are "damage" pieces. So you can add crushed road spots or broken windows. Because let's face it, super heroes rarely consider property damage.

And here is the Dinosaur Train inspired felt play mat. I based the design off a mental image of Buddy's home near the ocean. They live basically on a cliff, with a beach below. It would have been really hard to add that extreme of a difference in height, so I just kept them all at the same level.

I added the Lime Fun Fur Yarn to the edge of the grassy area. The person who this is for really likes the effects of the fun fur grass!

If you're not familiar with Dinosaur Train, it is about a family of pteranodons and their adopted son, Buddy the T-Rex. They go on many educational field trips on the Dinosaur Train, which can travel to any time. Meaning, of course, that they time travel. Often. Like, almost every episode. So of course that meant they needed a nest. And I took a stab at making a nest completely out of felt scraps. I used mostly medium and dark shades of brown, but did add a few sandy brown and burnt red pieces.

It came out pretty well.

I even added a needle felted egg!

I'm pretty happy with the way it came out.

I also added a cave.

I pinned it in place and needle felted it around the base.

Then I needle felted some mixed green wool around the base and entrance of the cave. We use Dimensions FeltWorks Multi-Color Roving Rolls. I picked these up from our local craft store and they are really great! I used a bunch of the other colors to make the flowers in the meadow (the flowery meadow in the pictures earlier in the post).

I love it! So cute!

And even though the Dinosaur Train isn't located right next to their nest, I still added some train tracks to play on. I'm working on a platform to add in the corner for them to wait on. :)

Don loves digging holes, so I'll add a few removable holes for him.

Tiny loves her hollow tree, so I added a hollow log (though it will move once the platform is made). Not exactly a tree, but it will have to do. I do not yet feel confident to make a whole tree. I'll attempt one soon. :)

Also just wanted to note, that I used threads that match the colors of the rocks for the second play mat (first picture below). You can definitely tell the difference. If you look at the picture below that, you can see that green thread was used. I personally like the way the top play mat looks with the matching threads. I always use DMC embroidery floss - so many colors to choose from and I can always find a perfect match for my felt.

I kind of want to add a toadstool to this one. :)

I'll update again once I have more to show of the other felt play mats. Here are the two that need more work: The Marvel City play mat and the second dinosaur play mat.

I'll be adding a 3D volcano to this play mat! And I'll be adding a needle felted stream to that hill. It will go all the way to the lake.

I'll update again once the Frozen, Minnie Mouse and second Marvel City felt boards are started.

Cross Stitch Projects Update

So I have been crazy busy lately and decided to take a break from blogging to get a head-start on my projects. I love making homemade Christmas gifts. It adds a personal touch and everyone always loves unique gifts! A few of the projects I can't share, because they are for people who read my blog. The other's I will share, with pictures and links (if I used a pattern) and tutorials (once I post the "finished" results).

For my Grandmother: She loves cardinals. And honestly while I did want to make a bigger pattern, with cute snow covered pines, I knew it would be better to make a smaller, simpler one that she could hang up all year long. I will very likely go ahead and make another one soon... Probably this Victoria Sampler, because fat cardinals are adorable!

Pattern: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/290341507202291321/

I'll finish it by placing it in a small wooden hoop. I just haven't found the perfect one yet!

For my Grandfather: He enjoys hunting and is especially fond of deer (*cry* but at least he butchers them and it fills his freezer, so I can't really judge). So I made him two cute deer cross stitches. I am slightly obsessed with both of them and will probably end up making my own soon. 

Here is the pattern (I find a ton of awesome and free patterns on Pinterest): http://www.pinterest.com/pin/290341507202291436/ This pattern was in black and white, really simple, but I wanted to add colors and just chose from the colors I already had on hand. 

I loved the effects of using DMC's Color Variations thread, because it was a lovely blend of different shades of green that made the forest and grass look really neat! I believe it was either Emerald Isle or Evergreen Forest. I also obsessively count stitches (because there is nothing more annoying than a stitch being out of place and absolutely ruining the whole pattern... usually only noticing after hours of work *sigh*) and use my trusty Disappearing Ink Pen to mark every ten stitches. The ink does fade a bit while stitching, but you can keep drawing the line and when you are finished, the ink will disappear on its own. 

Don't mind my haphazard stitching... there's a method to the madness, I swear.  

One thing I changed from the pattern... the buck has a stitch missing where the eye would be... but the doe didn't, and I personally thought it looked weird like that, so that's the only difference between my version and the original pattern. I just filled it in so they are solid silhouettes. I choose a sort of golden brown for the doe and a dark brown and lighter brown of a similar shade for the buck. Doesn't it look adorable? I still haven't decided how I'll finish this pattern, but I'm thinking of possibly making a wood chip filled decorative pillow. They smell amazing! Or maybe I'll just frame it.. I haven't decided yet, but I'll post the finished piece!

The Stag Pattern: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/290341507202291430/ Isn't he majestic? 

My grandmother specifically wanted me to make a pillow, because theirs are all old and starting to fall apart (despite being well-cared for). So I looked around and finally decided on this pattern. Now, their other pillows are 12x12" and I really tried to make that work for this pattern. But I was working with the materials I had on hand (our local craft store was out of the shade of Aida cloth I wanted to use), so it came out almost 2 inches taller. That being said, I'm now aiming for a 14x14" pillow and will let you know how it comes out!

I used DMC 14 Count Oatmeal Fabric and DMC 3371 Black Brown thread. I really liked both of these earthy tones and it came out amazing! The pattern would have come out small had I kept with the pattern, but I actually tried out a new stitch. It's known as the double cross stitch. You basically make a cross stitch and then add a second layer of stitches going across and down the middle. You're also stitching over two, so it will cover the space of 4 cross stitches. (Here are some directions if you're not familiar with the stitch - I started with the down and across stitch, followed by the cross stitch, because my reasoning was it might catch on less stuff... so we'll see how that goes.)

See, each of those squares can fit four cross stitches. I also made sure there was a two inch border on the sides, to be sure there was plenty of room for sewing it into a pillow. However, after I finished, I realized I should have measured out the whole pattern and started near the middle of the cloth, because now I have to find a coordinating fabric for the front of the pillow to go on the sides. I'll show you what I mean in a couple pictures...

At this point in the pattern, my boyfriend pointed out that this looks like a bad*** acorn (pardon the language. It kind of does. :)

And it's gone and just looks creepy now.

Finished! It looks awesome! I will definitely be using this stitch for future projects, because the texture is amazing! I admit I am a bit obsessed with feeling it. Up close they look like stars! 

Surprisingly it didn't take that long to make. I think I worked on it over the course of 2 or 3 days. Several hours, for sure, but less time than I was expecting to commit to it, which was a bonus! 

And finally the Merry Christmas cross stitch pattern (scroll to near the bottom for the free pattern).

Merry came out perfect...

But remember how I was talking about one tiny mistake ruining everything? Yeah, that happened with C. I was trying to finish it at midnight one night, so I could start on a new letter in the morning, and put a stitch in the wrong place... and did not notice. Until I got to s and t. I knew something was wrong immediately once I got to s. Typically I obsessively count stitches, but since I was just lining up the stitches when I was moving on to the next letter, I did not notice that each letter had an extra line. So that became apparent with s and t, as they each came up one line short.

I attempted to fill them in and they looked weird, so I kind of edited both letters and just added an extra line. Now you can barely notice the difference!

Also note to self: be sure to wash plastic hoops before using them, because this hoop made a yellow stain on part of the fabric. :(

Despite everything, I really like how the pattern came out!! The original pattern was made with gold thread in mind, but I went right for the traditional red and green and added a pretty ice blue shade for the snowflakes. 

I'm thinking of finishing this pattern as a decorative pillow. What do you think? 

There are three more patterns that I would love to share, but will have to wait to share after Christmas. I'm also working on a few other patterns, but they are not finished yet. One is HUGE and will probably take me a year to make (joking! probably..). 

Look forward to more cross stitch projects! I'll be making several different ones in the coming weeks. And our next post will be an update on the felt play mats I'm working on! So far I'm only (mostly) done one and the second is in the works. But there are about 12 of them on the list, and each different, so be sure to check them out!