Halloween Felt Stitch & Create with Spellbinders

Hello and welcome back!

Today I have something a little different to share with you—a felt stitching project!

Spellbinders was kind enough to send me two dies from the new Halloween Felt Stitch & Create collection by Nichol Spohr: the Charming Witch Hat and the Fright Night Feline.

The entire Halloween Felt Stitch & Create collection is absolutely darling, and I was excited to try my hand at felt stitching. This was something completely new for me, and I definitely learned a few things along the way. I’ll share those tips with you as I walk through my projects.

I have a YouTube video for these projects as well. You can check it out here: Spellbinders Halloween Felt Stitch & Create

Getting Started with Felt Stitching

The first thing I needed was felt specifically made for stitching. I learned quite a while ago that not all felt is created equal. If you want to die cut felt using craft dies, you’ll want to use Merino Wool Felt.

Luckily, Spellbinders carries several curated felt bundles. I ordered two collections—the Kaleidoscope Collection and the Trend Collection—which gave me a wonderful variety of colors to choose from for my projects.

Next, I dug into my embroidery floss stash. Fortunately, I was gifted a large wooden cigar-style box filled with embroidery floss. Much of it was very old—think 0.5 cents each!—but it was all still in perfect condition.

A few other tools I used included:

• Embroidery scissors
• An embroidery needle (I actually used a tapestry needle that has a  blunt end)
• A needle threader
• A crafting magnet or two
• A scoring stylus with a small metal ball tip or something small to poke with

And, of course, you’ll need a die-cutting machine and the appropriate plates. I used my Spellbinders Platinum 6, and it worked beautifully for cutting through the wool felt.

Charming Witch Hat

I started with the Charming Witch Hat.

I knew I didn’t want to make a traditional black witch’s hat, so I chose the Heather felt from the Trend Collection instead. I thought it was such a pretty color for fall.

I wasn’t sure whether wool felt had a specific side that should be used for cutting and stitching, so I looked it up. It turns out that wool felt can sometimes have a slightly smoother or more uniform side due to the pressing process used during manufacturing. However, it doesn’t matter which side you cut or stitch. It really comes down to personal preference.

I die cut the hat twice—one piece for the front and one for the back.

For the brown trim, I used a scrap of felt that I had received as part of an advent calendar from another craft company. I had just enough to cut two bands.

Stitching the Hat Band

I chose embroidery floss that coordinated with the brown wool felt. I started with a length of floss about as long as my arm.

When using embroidery floss, you’ll need to separate the individual strands. I found that lightly wetting my finger and tapping the end of the floss made this easier. I wanted to use three strands, but my first attempt at separating them resulted in quite a tangle!

I discovered that my glass-board magnets were very helpful. I placed three strands under one magnet and three under another, which allowed me to separate the strands more easily by pulling one finger down between the two set of strands. The key is to go slowly.

Note, the magnets also come in handy for keeping your needle secure when your not stitching.

To stitch the hat band, I started in the first hole at the bottom and stitched at an angle to the second hole in the top row. I went through to the back, skipped one hole at the bottom, and came back up at an angle through the next hole in the top row.

I continued this pattern across the entire band, skipping every other hole and creating diagonal stitches.

When I reached the end, I worked my way back across the band, stitching through the holes I had skipped on the first pass. This created a series of little X shapes across the band.

I finished by snipping the embroidery floss and tying it off on the back of the hat.

I repeated the same process on the second piece of felt for the back of the hat.

Adding Fall Embellishments

Once both hat bands were stitched, it was time to embellish the hat.

The Charming Witch Hat die set includes moon and star shapes that you can stitch onto the hat. Instead, I decided to give my hat more of a fall theme and add some colorful leaves and flowers.

For these embellishments, I used dies from another Nichol Spohr collection called Pumpkin Lane House, which was released last year. The set includes several adorable flowers and leaves.

I die cut one of each leaf and flower, along with the cute buttons for the flower centers. I stitched the centers of the leaves and flowers and then added the pieces to the front of my hat.

I wasn’t quite sure how to attach them at first, but I ended up stitching through the embellishments to the back of the hat and using hidden stitches to secure each leaf and flower in place.

I think the extra embellishments turned out really cute!

Stitching the Hat Together

Once the embellishments were finished, I was ready to stitch the two pieces of the hat together.

I found embroidery floss that closely matched the Heather wool felt. I started stitching on the right side of the bottom of the hat, again using every other hole on my first pass. I would come back through the skipped holes on the second pass to create a more finished stitch all the way around.

One very important thing I learned during this process is that it helps to poke out all of the stitching holes before you begin.

Sometimes the small pieces of felt left behind after die cutting don’t pop out completely. I discovered that a scoring stylus with a small metal ball tip worked perfectly for gently opening those holes.

This made it much easier to see where I needed to stitch. It becomes especially important when working with dark felt, as I discovered with the Fright Night Feline.

I continued stitching around the hat until I reached the bottom of the opposite side.

Stuffing the Hat

Next came the stuffing!

I used poly-fil and the little stuffing tool that came with my package of stuffing. I was careful not to overstuff the hat and also made sure not to push too hard with the tool because I didn’t want to poke through the felt.

Once I was happy with the amount of stuffing, I finished stitching across the bottom of the hat and tied off the thread between the two layers of felt.

I then threaded another needle with embroidery floss and stitched around the entire hat again, this time picking up all of the holes I had skipped on my first pass.

This second round of stitching gives the finished project a much more polished look. Once I made it all the way around, I tied off the thread between the layers with a couple of good knots and trimmed away the excess.

And that completed my Charming Witch Hat!

Fright Night Feline

Next up was the Fright Night Feline.

For the kitty, I cut the base from two pieces of black felt from the Spellbinders Kaleidoscope Collection.

I cut the eyes from the green felt called Potion, the ears and nose from Candy pink felt, and the mouth from Snow.

Once all of the face pieces were cut, I started stitching them onto the front of the kitty.

The die makes this part especially easy because it cuts all of the holes needed to perfectly align the facial elements. The pieces are quite small, so this part of the project didn’t take very long.

I used embroidery floss that coordinated with the pink ears and nose and the green eyes. For the mouth, I used black floss.

Once all of the face elements were stitched into place, I started joining the front and back pieces of the kitty together.

I decided to use black embroidery floss for this part—and about halfway through, I was definitely regretting that decision!

Black floss on black felt can be difficult to see, especially when you’re trying to keep track of which hole you’re stitching into. Thankfully, poking out all of the stitching holes beforehand made a huge difference.

I had a few missed and slightly wonky stitches along the way, but I hung in there and eventually got everything stitched together.

Adding a Hanger

When I reached the top of the Fright Night Feline’s head, between the ears, I added a small piece of cord to create a hanger.

I trimmed the cord to the length I wanted, inserted the ends between the layers of felt, and then stitched over the cord to secure it in place.

After quite a bit of stitching—and a little unstitching—I finally made it to the bottom and was ready to stuff my kitty.

Finishing the Feline

Once again, I used poly-fil and my little stuffing tool. I carefully added the stuffing to the head, being careful not to overfill it or poke through the felt.

When I was happy with the amount of stuffing, I finished stitching across the bottom and tied off the thread between the layers.

I threaded another length of black embroidery floss and made one final pass around the kitty, stitching through all of the holes I had skipped during my first pass.

And with that, my Fright Night Feline was finished!

After I was completely done, I noticed that Nichol Spohr had added whiskers to her kitty, and I immediately wished I had thought to do that!

There aren’t any die-cut holes for the whiskers, but you could easily add three stitched whiskers to each side of the face. I think that would be such a cute finishing touch.

What I Learned

I had so much fun with these projects and actually learned quite a bit about wool felt stitching along the way.

One thing I didn’t expect was how calming the stitching would be. After a long day of work, sitting down and stitching these little projects was surprisingly relaxing.

I also learned that taking a few extra minutes to prepare your felt—especially by making sure all of the stitching holes are open—can make the process much easier.

And while my stitching certainly isn’t perfect, I love how both projects turned out!

In the end, I have two adorable fall and Halloween decorations that I can display and enjoy.

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing how I created these projects and that I’ve inspired you to give wool felt stitching a try. The Halloween Felt Stitch & Create collection from Spellbinders is filled with so many fun designs, and I’m already thinking about what I might stitch next!

I will list and link the products I used from Spellbinders for your convenience. If you click on my links and purchase something I may earn a small commission.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and happy crafting!

Hugs,

Tonya