Fun with Felt - Gift Card Holders

I chose an easy project this week because I'm working on something a little more complicated for next week and need extra time to work on it.  I decided to make felt card holders from the Aranzi Cute Stuff book.  I thought they would work well as gift card holders. 

It really is a simple project.  If I didn't run into so many silly issues with my sewing machine it would have been perfect and I would have finished it in no time.  Sadly, this was not the case.  My machine didn't like to sew that close to the edge of the felt!  It kept eating it.  It's difficult to rip out seams on felt because it gets all fuzzy.  I ended up just sewing it and trimming all the weird threads because it wasn't cooperating.

I'm not thrilled with the outcome of this project, but I said in the beginning that I would post all of my projects - good or bad.  I just kept reminding myself that not not every project will be amazing...and that's okay. The important thing is that I tried.  I did learn some new things on the project so I'm still happy I did it.  I'm sure it will go better when I make these in the future because now I know what not to do.  ;-)

They turned out pretty good overall but I think when I make them again I will attempt to hand stitch them.   

See...

This green card holder is the first one I sewed.  I really like the flowers.

I learned how to sew an L-stitch and an S-stitch on this project so that made me happy.  I love learning how to do more hand sewing.  The S-stitch is the middle of the flower and all of the eyes.  The L-Stitch is the leaves on the green flower holder.

Originally I planned to put cute little eyes and a smile on the yellow but they were very small and hard to cut out.  Instead, I traced a duck shaped button I have.

The pattern didn't say anything about sewing around the applique pieces to hold them on.  I thought that was weird!  I tried to sew all the way around the pieces but wasn't happy about the way it looked since the pieces are so small.  I compromised and sewed a couple of stitches all the way around to secure them.  It doesn't look too great but it I didn't want them to just be attached by the eyes.  That's weird!

The dark blue card holder turned out the best.  I love the stars with smiley faces!!  The pattern gave them arms and legs but I didn't like that so I skipped it.  It's not like real stars have arms and legs.  They just sit up in the sky and smile down at us!

I love the little chick.  It took a lot of tries to get the beak to line up but I finally got it!

I think the fish look so cute on the light blue.  It looks like they are swimming in the ocean!

The white bunny was my favorite applique piece. 

I will probably make some themed gift card holders for Christmas later in the year.  I really like the idea of the project.  It's a really cute alternative to putting a gift card in an envelope.  I'll post pictures when I get around to making more.