Materials:
*Fabric
*18 gauge wire
*Brown or black pipe cleaners
*Wire cutters
*Round nosed pliers
*Flat nosed pliers
*Scissors
*All purpose adhesive
Directions:
*Print out several pictures of butterflies to use as templates for your butterflies.
*Following the picture, bend the wire to make wings. 18 gauge wire should be malleable enough to bend with your fingers, but if you are looking to add intricate detail (such as the detail in the wings of my purple butterfly), you may need to utilize pliers. I made four separate wings for each butterfly, but you could also construct two wings from wire or the entire butterfly from a piece of wire to simplify the process.
*Turn your fabric pattern side down.
*Glue the wire frame to the fabric. If you are putting the butterfly together in multiple pieces, make sure to leave space between the pieces when adhering them to the fabric.
*Once the adhesive has dried, cut out the butterfly's frame, leaving about 1/4" of excess fabric around the edges.
*Glue down the excess fabric so that it covers the exposed wire. To glue, cut the edge fabric into segments. As you near a rounded area or point in the frame, cut the segments into smaller and smaller pieces. For example, if you had something like the wing depicted in the picture below, you might wnat to cut the fabric along the black lines before gluing the fabric down. Cutting the fabric into small pieces enables you to go around corners without getting bunches or bulges in your fabric.
*Once your wings have dried, arrange them to form the butterfly, then glue them together.
*Add a pipe cleaner to create the butterfly's body.
*Once your butterflies are done, you can stick them to a wall or bookshelf, or make a butterfly garland like the one pictured below:
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