Throughout all of my years as a crafter, I’ve always adored making heart shaped things. I just find hearts such an easy, cheerful detail to add some personality to my space with! Often, however, heart shaped crafts are brightly coloured and don’t fit my home’s current decor scheme, which is a little more rustic chic and slightly beach inspired. I like florals, natural finishes and neutral colours, so I’ve been trying to come up with creative DIY ways to combine those things with the heart shape I love so much in order to make something that will suit my space a little bit better. That’s how this cute hanging vintage heart decor piece, that I’ve actually made several times now, came to be!
As I often do when I’m crafting, I decided to document the process that went into making these little decorative hearts. I love when other people share visuals and instructions when they make something fun and new, so opted to do the same thing for others with this project. Check out these step by step instructions complete with photos! If you’d rather follow along with a video tutorial instead of written words, scroll to the bottom of this post to find just what you’re looking for.
For this project, you’ll need:
- Heart shaped wooden base
- White felt
- Scissors
- Hot glue
- Lace ribbon
- Flower embellishments
Step 1:
Gather your materials! I got my heart shaped wire and wooden strip wrapped heart and my local craft store, which kicked off the whole idea and inspired the entire project. Cut a strip about an inch wide and four inches long from your felt sheet. Cut this into three even little rectangles and then round off the corners and straight edges to make little white leaves with circular bottoms and pointed tips, almost like a teardrop shape. I used one corner on each rectangle as the leaf’s pointed tip and rounded the rest off from there.
Step 2:
Cut a piece of ribbon about four inches long and fold it in half so its loose ends meet and the other end is a bend halfway down its length. Slide the bent end through the ring on the top of your wood and wire heart (or between the wood pieces if your heart doesn’t have a loop) and make a slip knot by putting the loose ends through the bend in the ribbon and tightening the knot down over and around the loop. You can tie the ends of this piece into a knot to make a hanging loop for your heart or leave them loose and decorative if you’d rather just lean it on the mantle; whichever you please.
Step 3:
Cut another piece of ribbon about four inches long and make it into a bow. First, bend and curve one side in towards the ribbon’s middle point to make a loop that crosses over with a bit of excess end past the centre. Apply a dot of hot glue on the middle spot and stick the piece down. Then apply a dot of hot glue on top of the crossover you just made and curl the other side inwards in the same way, making a loop and sticking the ribbon down with an excess end where it crosses over the others. Trim the ends so they’re even with each other. I cut mine on an angle to prevent the ribbon from fraying.
Step 4:
Cut a piece of lace ribbon long enough to wrap all the way around the heart once and leave an inch and a half of excess like ribbon ends. I applied glue on the far right side under the heart’s right rounded top curve and anchored my ribbon there, folding one piece under so the inch long excess ribbon end sticks out diagonally the other direction and downwards. Wrap the lace ribbon all the way around the back of the heart and back to the front and glue it down overlapping the first end, making the same under fold to leave a decorative end downward the other way too. Trim these ends to be even and cut them on an angle to stop fraying as well.
Step 5:
Pinch the rounded ends of each white felt leaf slightly and apply glue. Stick them right on top of where your lace ribbon ends meet, at different angles so the tips splay outwards to the top and diagonal sides.
Step 6:
Cut another piece of ribbon about four inches long and fold it in half like before. In the crease at the ribbon’s halfway point, create a small back-fold so the two faces of your ribbon both face upwards; hold the fold in place with a dot of glue. Apply glue to the back of your ribbon’s folded top and nestle the ribbon under the bases of where your three leaves are glued down so the ribbon ends hang towards the heart’s tip. Feel free to trim these so they are even or cut them at an angle to stop the ribbon from fraying.
Step 7:
Apply glue to the back of your ribbon bow from before and stick it on top of the ribbon ends you just glued down at the base of the leaves. Then apply glue to the backs of your little rosettes or crafting flowers and stick them down over the leaf bases as well so they nestle together above the bow.
That’s really all there is to it! You could also get creative with colours and base shapes, depending on the cool things your local craft store might have that mine didn’t. Just in case you’d like to try this project out for yourself, here’s a fantastic tutorial video to help you!
The post appeared first on .
