project // cozy enchanted forest quilt ornament

'Tis the season to make felt ornaments! This is one of my favorite things to make and I'm especially excited to share this free Christmas tree ornament pattern.

The basic supplies are simple and so is the stitching. There's even a low-sew option you'll find as you read on. That makes these fast and easy to make!



I've made lots of ornament designs, and this one follows the basic process that I use in almost all of them. In fact, it's kind of like an extension to my most recent set of felt ornament patterns, the Cozy Quilt Block set. It's also based on my friend Kristin's Enchanted Forest Quilt, making this an extra quilt block-inspired ornament design!



Every time I look at my fabric stash, I keep finding new ideas for making Christmas tree quilts, but I just don't have time to make them all. However, making these trees super tiny and as ornaments is much faster, so that inspired me to make some fused fabric versions. And I love them. They capture the feeling of the Enchanted Forest quilt blocks, but literally take 10 minutes to make. You can even make them scrappy to show off several fabrics!

And ou can use this same technique with my other Cozy Quilt Blocks. Consider this a whole new way to use the Wild Olive Felt Ornament patterns you already have!

Now, let's start making some ornaments!



Here's what you need:
• Wool or wool blend felt
• Embroidery floss
• Stuffing
• Freezer paper and Pencil
• Iron
• Tracing paper
• Scissors
• Scallop Shears (optional)
• Needle

For a low-sew option, you will also need:
• Fabric scraps
• Wonder Under paper-backed fusible web

DOWNLOAD THE COZY ENCHANTED FOREST QUILT ORNAMENT PATTERN



Trace the two circle templates onto freezer paper. Cut out the smaller one. Iron the larger, non-cut circle onto the felt for the back of your ornament and the smaller, cut circle onto the felt for the front of the ornament.

Cut out the larger circle with regular scissors and the smaller circle with scallop shears. The scallops should extend outside the freezer paper templates. This is optional, but so cute.

Peel off the freezer paper.

This year I also worked with Benzie Design to create deep-etch dies that perfectly cut the plain and scalloped circles. They are sold out at the time of this post, but you can get notified when they are available again. Go check out the Circles and Scallops Dies.



Trace the tree pieces onto freezer paper and iron them onto the felt for your tree and stump. I made my main tree pieces all one color, but you can make them different too.



Embroider the face on the tree using three strands of black embroidery floss. Need help? Check out my video for how I stitch faces!



Cut out the shapes and then peel off the freezer paper. For the piece with the face, peel and tear away the paper.



Trace the wonky stars onto tracing paper and lay it over your top circle. Embroider the stars with three strands of embroidery floss. I used back stitch, with one stitch per line of the star. I also wove the stitches!

Carefully tear away the tracing paper.



Lay the felt pieces out on the scalloped circle and then use two strands of matching embroidery floss to stitch around the edges with whip stitch. You can see how I do that in this video!



Layer the two felt circles and stitch around the edge with running stitch and three strands of embroidery floss.



Pause when there's a small opening and add a bit of stuffing to your ornament if you'd like. Finish stitching around the ornament to close it up.



With three strands of embroidery floss, take a stitch through the back of the ornament near the top. Tie the ends together to make a hanger!



It's a cozy Enchanted Forest Quilt tree all ready to add to YOUR tree!



If you want to make one of these with a little less stitching (which makes it faster), you can do that! I'm showing these with the Enchanted Forest tree, but you can use this same technique with my other ornament patterns. I'm currently working on a Dresden ornament from my Cozy Quilt Block set, but with vintage fabrics.



Trace the tree pieces onto the paper side of Wonder Under and iron them to the wrong side of your fabric. This is a great way to use up tiny scraps!



Cut out the pieces and peel off the paper backing. Arrange them on the front felt circle.



Iron the pieces in place.



If you want to embroider a face on your ornament, now's the time to do that. If you embroider before you iron the pieces down, the fabric will be lumpy.

Also, if you want to add the wonky stars embroidery, you can do that at this step. Then finish the ornaments just like the all felt version. I left the stuffing out of these for a different look and I still love it!



I have already made even more of these little ornaments to give to folks and I see myself making more still. Using special fabrics for the trees feels like a great way to preserve memories or celebrate favorite fabrics.




Whether you are making one little felt ornament or dozens, I hope you find this tutorial helpful! And if you want to make a bunch of quilt block ornaments, be sure to check out the Cozy Quilt Blocks pattern set!

introducing the enchanted forest quilt and embroidery patterns!

I am very happy to tell you about a collaboration between my friend Kristin of woollypetals and me. And it's called the Enchanted Forest Quilt. This quilt is filled with adorable trees: some have happy little faces, some have ornments and garlands, some have snowcaps, and lots more.

English paper piecing in my usual quilt method favorite. Traditional quilting, like this quilt uses, is less my thing because I'm not always a super precise machine sewist. But I've made an exception for this (and probably for more woollypetals quilts going forward).



If you're unfamiliar with woollypetals, let me tell you about my friend. First, Kristin is so sweet and getting to spend time with her (and our small group of sewing friends!) often helps bring about some of the ideas that keep Wild Olive going. It's a bit of a brain trust! She designs super cute quilt patterns, many of which use a lot of simple patchwork, and I always look at them and want to make them.

But I've been intimidated by all the squares. You see, I really dislike cutting all the pieces. But we'll come back to that.

So there we were, looking at these tree quilt blocks Kristen had made and our friend Faith said something like "These would be so cute with strings of lights on them!" And a collaboration was born. We almost immediately started the conversation around what it would look like for me to design a companion embroidery pattern so folks could add decorations to their trees.





I knew that lights would be a must, so there are three styles of lightbulbs in the pattern set (large, round, and small), and ornaments were the next thing we talked about. I ended up making two styles of baubles, a star, a heart, a bird, and a mushroom (which goes with the mushroom mini block in the quilt pattern!).

But I felt like this could go beyond a few motifs. The Enchanted Forest Quilt has 8 styles of tree blocks, a snowman, wonky stars, and those mushrooms, so mix and match is a big part of this.

So I created 4 garlands (popcorn and cranberries are my favorite!), some candies and a gingerbread kid, snowflakes, and presents to go under the trees. And I ended up with a 25-page pattern.

You can watch how I use the patterns in the video below. I think it's helpful for people who quilt but haven't embroidered their quilts before (at least in the way I did mine), but it's also a good way to get an idea for what you can do with the Enchanted Forest Bundle.

Now let me share a bit about the quilt part of this.

I've only done a little bit of traditional quilt making. And as I said, the cutting part always intimidates me because getting it wrong can mess up everything after that. My imprecise sewing can do that too, but that's a whole other thing. So while I wanted to make the very quilt I was designing patterns for, I was also nervous.

But Kristin showed me the special ruler she uses. It's called the Stripology XL ruler and it's so fancy! And it also made all the difference for me. I cut hundreds of squares in a few hours which would have taken me several cutting sessions without the ruler.

I got my ruler (and a bunch of the fabric I'm using on my Enchanted Forest Quilt) from Missouri Star Quilt Company. I'm a partner, which means if you use my link you'll save 15% and support my work at the same time.



Back to the quilt making. The pattern is for advanced beginners and I'm not sure if I'm very far past beginner. But because there a lots of ways to make the trees, there are options for everyone. You can make them simple (even more simple than I did) or you can add more patchwork and some foundation paper piecing (a technique I've tried exactly one time).

You can also make this with more or fewer blocks to change the size and scale of the project.

Can you tell I'm excited about this? Because I absolutely am. I'm making a quilt, I created super cute embroidery patterns (which do also work for non-quilty things), and I got to collaborate with a friend. It was so much fun.

You can find the quilt pattern alone in the woollypetals shop, the embroidery pattern alone in my shop, or until the end of the year you can get the discounted bundle in either of our shops.

pattern // remember me floral embroidery design

Back in the spring I shared a Remember Me embroidery pattern that was connected to Jesus' last supper and communion. But when I was working on it, the song Remember Me from the Disney/Pixar film Coco kept playing in my head. I knew then that I needed to make a Coco version with flowers, and my plan was to save it for October.

Día de Muertos starts on November 1st and is a celebration and remembrance of deceased relatives, and that's a key element of the movie Coco. Flowers, and specifically marigolds are an iconic part of the celebration and they are used for LOTS of decoration. I'm not going to claim to know a whole lot about Día de Muertos (my family is Swedish!), but I think it's beautiful.

And no matter if this holiday is part of your family heritage and tradition, if you're a big fan of Coco, or if you just want to stitch something as a reminder of a loved one, I think this is a fun pattern to embroider any time of the year.

DOWNLOAD THE REMEMBER ME FLORAL PATTERN

For this design, I show some colors in the PDF, but I don't have any specific DMC colors to suggest. Use what you like for where you will display your embroidery. You may want to start with the flower colors you'll use.

At the size provided in the PDF (printing at 100%), I would suggest stitching with all six strands of embroidery floss. If you go smaller, consider using fewer strands and if you go larger, you could even use a thicker thread like DMC's soft matte cotton or tapestry wool. Obviously, you would want to make sure your fabric will accomodate anything you use.

As for stitches, I'm always a fan of the basics: back stitch outlines, french knot eyes, and a scallop mouth. The center of the two flowers would be best with lazy daisy (detached chain). And if you don't want the face, add a lazy daisy flower in the middle of the large flower. If you were to stitch this a little smaller, you could stitch the flower outlines with scallop stitch, which has a loopy effect.

Finally, if you stitch this, I think it's a wonderful project to slow down on. Take time with each stitch to think about the people you love and the ones who have gone before you. And maybe hum a few bars of Remember Me...

Want to stitch more for Día de Muertos? Check out my sugar skulls pattern with more flowers!

pattern // loth-cat cross stitch chart

If you've been watching the new Ahsoka show on Disney+ or if you're a fan of animated Star Wars series, you might be familiar with Loth-Cats. My sister loves them, so I created a cross stitch pattern so I could make her a cute little hoop, and now I'm sharing the pattern with you!

Interestingly enough, my sister was introduced to this adorable furry creature at the Galaxy's Edge at Walt Disney World. They have one there that sleeps and snores in one of the shops, but it's in a cage so you can't touch it. Of course, they also sell a stuffed toy version that you can pet (it purrs!) and take home with you. My sister has played with this thing so many times but it's kinda big to carry home and so has resisted the purchase. My plan goal is to convince her that she just needs this thing.



Anyway, I couldn't resist the urge to stitch a loth-cat and so here we are.

I love making Star Wars related patterns, and the timing of Ahsoka coming out near my sister's birthday made this perfect. Previously I made my brother an Ahsoka Tano neck pillow, but there are lots of other Star Wars patterns for making soft toys, embroidery, and cross stitch all here on my blog.




This is a pretty easy pattern to stitch. Not many colors, and only whole cross stitches with the teeniest amount of back stitch.

DOWNLOAD THE LOTH-CAT CROSS STITCH PATTERN PDF

If you are feeling adventurous, you could easily change the colors and the fur markings because these creatures are not all the same. I especially like the lighter colored ones that look like they might belong on a snow-covered planet. I went for the markings that match the plush that my sister loves!

As a reminder, I make these Star Wars patterns just for fun because I love them and so do my family members. The characters are owned by LucasArts, so you shouln't sell any of the things you make with these patterns. But you SHOULD stitch them up and enjoy them!

project // quilt star book band

It's officially back-to-school time. And that makes me want to craft school-type things. Like a book band that can hold a stuffed full notebook together or also double as a bookmark. But what's even better is that you can use this same idea to make a reusable gift bow! We'll get to that in a moment.

This month I shared a wallpaper that has a quilt star on it, and I wanted to use that design to make something fun and not too complicated. So that's what inspired this. Even though it's based on a traditional quilt block, the plan was not "make a quilt." In fact, there's not really any sewing involved. Just a few embroidery stitches.

And the way this works is that it has elastic to stretch around your book, whether that's a notebook, binder, text book, or even a favorite novel. What's even better is that you don't even need a pattern. You just cut some squares and then cut some of the squares into triangles. Easy!

I like things with faces, so I embroidered a face on mine, which also matches the wallpaper I shared. But I realized that you could use the center of the quilt block to show off a favorite design on fabric, which led to the gift bow version.



I found this adorable Santa fabric (it's from the line called 'Twas the Night by Jill Howarth for Riley Blake) and I thought it would be so cute in the middle of the star! I don't always like to fussy cut fabric, but celebrating a cute print like this was worth wasting a bit. The quilt star has a bow-like look to it, and I realized that you could use the elastic to go around a box as easy as you could a book.

Instead of disposable ribbon (or even other fancy ribbons), this makes a cute addition to a gift and the recipient to pass it along on another gift or keep it to use as a book band later. Who doesn't love double-use projects?

With all of that project background in mind, let's make a quilt star book band!



You will need:

Small Pieces of Fabric
Wonder Under (or other paper-backed fusible web)
Wool-Blend Felt
Fold-Over Elastic
Embroidery Floss
Scissors
Iron and Ironing Board
Ruler and Rotary Cutter
Needle
Optional: Fabric Glue



Cut two small pieces of Wonder Under and two small pieces of fabric (one for the center and one for the points). Iron the fusible web to the back of the fabric. Cut the pieces down to 1-1/2 inch squares.



Cut the fabric that will be the points in half and then in half again so you have four small squares. Cut each of those in half from corner to corner. You will now have eight triangles.

Note: If you don't have a rotary cutter, you can still mark the squares and triangles with a ruler and then cut them with scissors.

Arrange the trianges around the edges of the center square as shown.



Peel the paper backing off the fabric pieces. This can be the trickiest part. On the triangles, it's best to peel from the right-angle corner. It just comes off easier.



Place all the pieces down on the felt, making sure that the edges line up well. Carefully iron the pieces so they don't shift.



Cut around the quilt star, leaving a little bit of felt showing.



Place the cut star on top of the felt and cut a second star shape to match.



Embroider a face on the quilt star if you want. I used six strands of floss and just freehand stitched it like you see me do in this video.

Cut two slits in the plain felt star like this:



Fold the star in half so the fold is vertical. Cut on the fold with each cut about half-as wide as your elastic.



Cut a piece of fold-over elastic. Slide it through the slits in the plain star.

I cut my elastic to 18 inches. It's long enough to tie the ends with a knot and go around a composition book.

If you're making this to fit a larger binder or a gift box, you should add several inches. For smaller books or boxes, use less elastic. Remember that you want this to stretch to hold around a book or box, but it shouldn't pull tight.



Place the quilt star on top of the star with the elastic. Stitch around the edge with three strands and running stitch. Make the stitches right next to the fused fabric.



Make sure that the elastic isn't twisted and then tie the ends together with an overhand knot.



Slide the book band around a notebook and you're all set to study, write, draw, and more!



For the gift bow version I made, I used glue instead of stitching and a knot. First, I glued the two layers of felt together. This is a lot faster than stitching, but it does need time to dry.

To make the elastic band flat, which is nicer for the underside of a box, I started by trimming the elastic end with a scallop shear (pinking shears or plain scissors are good too). Then I overlapped the ends and used fabric glue here as well. Once again, make sure that the length of elastic is correct and then give this enough time to dry before adding to a gift box.



Even on a simple white box, this bow band makes it festive. And there's no waste!




No matter which version you make, these are fun and fast. The quilt inspiration make me smile and I love that you can use them in different sorts of ways!

Happy crafting!