Last month I got the opportunity to guest post over at The Southern Institute. I was so excited! It is such a lovely blog, run by Jenny, who is just the sweetest! She has great sewing tutorials and much, much more! Be sure to check it out!
When I got the invitation to guest post I knew that I wanted to do something summery and fun, with plenty of color involved. I am a bit of a color junkie. I also thought I would do a sewing project. But then this happened…..
Yikes. We live with my dad, and a major remodel happened at his home recently. My sewing machine is somewhere in that garage….I hope! But I sure as heck don’t know where, so today I am bringing you a no-sew project instead! Thank goodness for Heat ‘n Bond, right?!
Here’s the thing, though: if I had my sewing machine I probably would have topstitched down all of the ribbons, etc. on these towels just for the sake of longevity. I never really trust anything that isn’t sewn to stay together. But you can choose how to proceed if you choose to create some fun watermelon towels of your own!
Now let’s get creating!
I was walking through Target last month and stopped to pick up some plain, colored dish towels, thinking that I would probably create some fun and flirty ones for this guest post. Right next to the towels were a few aprons, and one of them was bright pink with watermelons on it. It bit me with the watermelon bug, and I set out to make these summery watermelon towels for our newly renovated (eek!) kitchen.
Here is what you will need to make these No-Sew Watermelon Towels:
* plain, colorful dish towels (I got mine at Target.)
* pink and green felt
* black puff paint (or a permanent marker may work as well)
* ULTRAHOLD Heat ‘n Bond/Wonder Under – both in tape form AND in roll form (It needs to be the sew-free ULTRAHOLD kind unless you intend to stitch down the ribbons once you have ironed them into place.)
* a variety of ribbon and/or rick rack (I just gathered up stuff I had around the house….I seem to have a bit of a ribbon hoarding problem! Sheesh!)
Grab your Heat ‘n Bond roll and cut off two squares of it for your felt.
Place the Heat ‘n Bond BUMPY SIDE DOWN on your felt and use a hot, dry iron to iron the it onto the felt.
Now draw your watermelon onto the paper side of the Heat ‘n Bond with a pencil. (For some reason I couldn’t get any pens to work well on it. Odd.) You can freehand it if you would like. I happened to have come across my little sister’s middle school protractor in the desk in her old bedroom the other day, so I used that as a stencil. It was very random, but it worked out quite well.
Cut out your pink watermelon and use it to trace and cut out the green rind. Make the rind a bit wider than the melon so no pink edges will be peeking out.
Peel the paper off of the Heat n’ Bond, place it carefully on your towel, and iron the felt cutout firmly onto the towel. I find that with thick materials like felt (and rick rack) it is helpful if I iron the towel to warm it up, THEN place the felt, and THEN iron on top of the felt to seal the two together.
Time for embellishments! Play with ribbons and lay them out however you would like them. Once you find an arrangement that makes you happy, cut your ribbons to the width of the towel and use a bit of Fray Check to seal the edges.
Now you are going to use the Heat ‘n Bond TAPE to iron on the ribbons. For the thinner ribbons I actually had to cut the tape in half, as shown below. You will follow the same procedure as you did with the felt. Place the BUMPY SIDE of the Heat ‘n Bond down on the ribbon and iron that on. Then you will peel off the paper, place it on the towel in exactly the spot that you like it, and then iron it on carefully. Before I show you pictures of that process, let me give you two important tips.
Tip 1: I used JUMBO rick rack. You will need to go at least that wide for Heat ‘n Bond. I had to cut the Heat ‘n Bond strip in half, and it still peeked out a bit, as you can see in the pictures below. However, once the paper is peeled off you can no longer see it, so don’t stress over it.
****VERY VERY VERY IMPORTANT TIP: After ironing down your ribbons and rick rack DO NOT PICK UP THE TOWEL RIGHT AWAY! If you pick it up while everything is still warm it will fall right off. However, if you wait until the towel and ribbons have cooled down and “set” they should be firmly attached. I repeat: WAIT FOR EVERYTHING TO COOL OFF BEFORE YOU MOVE IT! I learned this the frustrating way. Save yourself that sorrow by taking my advice!
Ok, now we can take a look at the ribbon attachment process via pictures.
Once everything is attached AND COOLED OFF, then it is time to use puff paint to add seeds to your watermelon. Be sure to practice first and squeeze the first bubbles out of your paint! Give you paint plenty of time to dry.
Now you can enjoy your fun, summery watermelon towels! If you sewed them you can throw them in the dryer, but if not you may want to dry them flat after washing. That is what I will be doing.
This post was originally published on The Southern Institute.
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Courtney O'Dell says
July 11, 2013 at 8:28 pmThese are so fun- they would be awesome for party favors or small gifts!