Zip it, flower! A recycling tutorial

My mother could mend anything and if she could not mend it, then it was saved just in case, which would explain why, when she was knocked off her bike in her 70s and had stitches, she was able to find a sterile stitch cutter in her sideboard so I could take her stitches out.  


Now you will remember that the quality and capacity of her button jars were legend along with her useful bits of twine collection, however I am wishing that I had kept a hold of her zapped out zip collection because that is just what you are going to need to today to create these edgy, flower corsages or hair barrettes.

You will need:

A zip, of between 18 - 24" long depending on how big you want the flower to be

Needle and Thread

Scissors... not your good dressmaking scissors
Glue gun

Brooch backing
Felt 
Buttons (optional)
Matches or a lighter
Shot glass
Cardboard

Take your zip and cut the bottom of it off, this may be quite difficult if you use a heavy duty zip but I really like to use these as the flower looks really edgy.  Then using your matches, flame the end of your zips to ensure that they will not unravel, a gentle burning will seal them shut.

Take one side of your zip and fold it to make petals as is shown in the picture.  

Now there are two ways to sew this together with a double thread, you can make all five petals together and hold it in place with a couple of pins... but remember you will be sewing through 10 layers, which is possible although you should know that I managed to stab myself with the needle, so be careful. (I wonder if this counts as an industrial injury?)  

However with the next layer, as the petals will be shorter and therefore there will be more layers so catch each pattern individually.  There are a number of ways that you can finish your flower...


With my larger heavy duty zip, I left a couple of inches over at the end and rolled it up like a rose, and oversewed the edges and then sewed it through to the base.

For the lighter zip, I went through my buttons and beads and sewed them into the centre of the flower.

Cut out two circle of felt using the top of the glass and then one circle from the cardboard using the base of the glass which will be smaller.  Sew the larger flower into the centre of one of the felt circles.


Heat up your glue gun and dob your glue on the centre of your big set of petals, then place the smaller set of petals into the middle... then hold it in place of if you are doing several use a clothes peg to hold it together.

Glue one of the felt circles to the base of the flower, then smear a little glue onto the  cardboard and place it on the middle of the felt disc which has the flower attached to it.

Sew the brooch pin onto the remaining felt circle.  Place this disc on top of the other disc attached to the flower, now you could just glue it but we are going to do a superb finish by using a small blanket stitch to sew around the edge... just like the one we learnt back in January.

Now find a garment that is lovely enough to attach your fabulous flower corsage  and then whilst you are thinking about that, off you go an look at the crafting loveliness that is Handmade Monday.


And while I think about it, let's all send get well soon wishes to Little Harriet who usually contributes to Handmade Monday and is in hospital utilising some heavy duty antibiotics to tame her CF... mind you, I think she may have taken her fabulous crochet in with her, so I am expecting great things from her in the weeks to come. :)

Buttons & bows - Christmas Tutorial no 5

The Button Jar

Since I was a child I loved my mother’s button jars, they were so exciting and in our house they were colour coded.  There was the white jar which contained the shirt buttons, snipped from exhausted shirts worn to within an inch of their lives with turned collars and cuffs and strung together for re-use and then my favourites, the dainty Mother of Pearl buttons, that caught the light and sparkled.  Then there was the bigger jar with huge coat and jacket buttons, in forbidding hues of navy, black and brown with horn buttons thrown in for light relief. And finally, my favourite the oddities, they were the bright shiny buttons, or the small delicate jobs shaped like flowers and I even seem to remember a few stray RAF buttons removed from my father’s Greatcoat.

Before my mother died she joked, “I’m not worried about making a will as I know that you two have got the contents of the house divvied up down to the button jars!”

So I thought we would make a practical and personal gift this week – a button jar with handmade buttons.  You will need:

A Leifheit Jar ( be impressed now, this is the official name for jar where the lid comes in two pieces, a metal disc and screw band)

Kapok stuffing

A heavy drill cotton scrap – eg, Ticking

Cardboard

Glue gun (well now I have one I should practice with it!)

6 Self covering buttons

Contrasting fabric scrap

Iron on fabric paints – or

Embroidery threads

Pencil or fabric marking pen

The embroidery hoop you can see belonged to my mum and is over 70 years old

Access to your kitchen for round items to draw around... or if you still have that set from Geometry or a Mason in the family, a pair of compasses

Embroidery hoop

Needle and scissors

Suggested contents to add to the jar

Small sharp pointy scissors

Set of sewing needles

White, Black Navy and Brown cotton

Hooks and Eyes

Take the jar apart and find in your kitchen a saucer, pint glass or large mug which is approximately 1" wider in radius than your metal disc lid.  Use this as a template to draw out a circle on your ticking fabric and then use the metal disc to cut out a circle of cardboard and cut out another piece of fabric about half an in wider in circumference.

Now using a double thread, tie a knot in the end and starting from the back of the fabric, make small running stitches about 1/4" from the edge.  Bundle up your stuffing and place it on top of the metal disc and capture the with your fabric... don't pull the fabric  tight until you are happy with amount of your stuffing, ie will it be able to hold needles and pins but not too full that you cannot get the screw band over it.  Now pull your thread tightly and sew off with a very firm couple of stitches.

Using the other circle, repeat the gathering process and place the cardboard circle in the centre, gather up the fabric around it and fasten off securely.  Now you can either glue the cardboard circle to the lid or whipstitch the two together - whipstitch is a simple over sewing stitch to join two seams together.

Now the jar is ready to be filled... so let's make some buttons to go inside.

Let's say that your button is an inch wide, then draw a circle that is 1.5" in radius, draw six circles like this  quite closely to each other and don't cut them out as we are going to stretch them over an embroidery hoop... I said DON'T cut them out, *tuts*

Now you have two choices, if you don't enjoy embroidery use your paints to creat a simple design on the fabric... I am the least artistic person you can meet so I will have go with needle and thread.  Let you imagination run riot... flowers, animals, shapes, letters, just go for it.

Carefully cut out your finished circles and with your doubled up thread sew a 1/4" from the edge, place the button in the centre and draw the fabric up.  

Now this is the fiddly bit, gently place the back cover over the button shank and push home firmly, you are allowed to swear quietly if the back cover pings off, this will happen about 50% of the time, it's the law!

Cut out a square of cardboard and using a large sharp needle, sew a couple of stitches to attach the button to the card.  If you have a compliant printer, print up some suitable wording to put on the card

.

So there you have it a day to day button jar with everything you need for a button emergency... and something for your children to fight over when you go!

And now for the really good stuff, pop over to Wendy's Homemade Monday and don't forget to leave a comment.  Have a great week :)