Valentine Patches

Every once in a while, while blog-surfing, I'll come across a post that makes me say 'I HAVE to try that!'. One post that did that this week was Alphamom's post on Homemade Felt Valentine Patches. The resulting patches looked too fun, and Lindsey made them sound so easy to make. What a fun idea to make with the boys.

Well, it's a good thing that I decided to try this out on my own during my post-boy-bedtime craft slot. For a quick run-down, you cut a shape from a plastic bag, color it with permanent markers, then iron it to a piece of felt using a piece of parchment paper as a barrier to protect your iron. Sounds easy enough. An hour and a half later, I finally was able to get a bit of plastic bag to melt to the felt. Here are two hasty samples I was able to iron before running off to bed:


Key items learned:
1 - work out the process first before setting up a production line. I spent too much time decorating bag bits that I ended up just throwing away
2 - not all Target bags are the same. Ours must be thinner than the author's as I couldn't get the bag piece to melt enough to really adhere to the felt. After being melted on, the plastic peeled easily from the felt. Luckily, we had a couple thick plastic bags that the boys got at a Halloween party - thick enough to melt down into the felt.
3 - not all parchment paper is the same. Though the box read 'non-stick parchment paper', every bag piece I tried to stick to the felt stuck to the paper instead. EVERY piece. In fact, they adhered so well that I couldn't peel them off. Luckily, I have an applique ironing sheet - a non-stick sheet for putting iron-on appliques together - that worked like a champ.

I was hoping to get patches put together last night that I could turn into necklaces over the weekend. (Necklaces are the twins' latest craze.) With Valentines Day looming on Monday, the pressure's on! Hopefully, now that I have a successful process worked out, I can get back to that assembly line method I started out with last night and have necklaces put together by Sunday night!

I also finally got a picture of the boys' finished boot bags:

If you look closely at the 't' and 's' in 'Boots' on Cal's bag, you can see the heavy thread used. Thankfully, the thread blends well enough to not be an eyesore. The bags work wonderfully and, because they are fleece, don't get very wet or muddy.