Christmas in July Bows

I'm taking a decidedly different approach towards Christmas this year by starting my crafting early. A few months ago I stumbled across a great tutorial on gift bow making and I knew it would come in handy for the holidays. My first big task is to make a ton of handmade bows for this year's Christmas presents.

I've used the bow tutorial before with regular paper, but I found some decorative duct tape that I thought would make really cool bows as well...


and here's the result...


Once I saw that I could make bows using duct tape, I wanted to try making more using other unexpected material. So I gathered up a few things from around my house and started making bows.


Out of denim...


a gift bag...


burlap...


grosgrain ribbon...


and decorative tissue paper...


In order to use denim and burlap for the bows, I first dabbed fabric stiffener on the material and let it dry. This was one of the easiest crafts I've done thanks to the tutorial - you should try it!

Burlap Easter Basket

This week's challenge over at the CSI Project is to make something using a material I have never worked with before: burlap. My first thought was to take a pass on this one, but I just love a good challenge! So, in keeping with the Easter theme, here is my best first attempt at making a burlap Easter basket.

The first thing I did was soak a large piece of burlap in fabric stiffener and then cut it into strips.



Next, I glued some of the strips onto the bottom of a plastic plate that served as the base of the basket (lots of improvising went on during this process).



Once the strips were on, I flipped the plate over to start the weaving process. I know it looks kind of crazy at this point, still improvising...



I then started to weave the other burlap strips through the ones that were glued to the plate using the "over-under" approach.



I only needed to weave in 4 horizontal rows because the strips were pretty wide. Finally, I decided to make a little burlap bunny to embellish the basket.



And here is the final result...

The fabric stiffener was definitely the key to making this basket happen. I just love it when a great improvised plan comes together!






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