Zombie Felt Chocolates

     Why stop at a zombie candy box?  Give your loved ones a gift with a little bite.

Materials:

*Dark brown felt
*Light brown felt
*Brown thread or embroidery floss
*White thread or embroidery floss
*Red thread or embroidery floss
*Black thread or embroidery floss
*Stuffing
*Ruler
*Metallic marker
*Pencil
*Printer paper

Directions:

*Measure the dimensions of the chocolate cups in your candy box to determine the ideal dimensions for your chocolates.

*Either by hand or using digital software, draw out two dimensional chocolate shapes matching the shape and dimensions of each chocolate compartment.

*Trace and cut out two copies of each shape onto either dark or light brown felt.  If you have multiple candy cups of the same shape, you will want to trace twice the number of shapes as there are compartments with that shape.  For example, my candy box had two identical spots for rectangular candies, so I cut out four rectangular shapes.

*Using your thread or embroidery floss, embroider faces and designs on half of the chocolate shapes.  For some of the chocolates, I wanted to apply a chocolate or white chocolate drizzle effect, so I used a backstitch to sew on diagonal lines first.  Then I created the faces using black thread, which didn't work out super well for the darker chocolates.  After I finished the mouth and eyes, I added some red thread at the corners of the mouths to look like dripping blood.

*Once the faces are done, cut off a strip of felt 1/2" thick and a little longer than the perimeter of one of your chocolates.

*Wrap the felt around the perimeter of the chocolate, overlapping the ends until the felt runs along the edge of your chocolate.  Sew ends together.

*Next you're going to want to sew the chocolate to the felt ring.  If I could do this project over again, I would use blanket stitch, as I think that would have given the chocolates a nicer shape.  So, you can either place the chocolate right side up and place the ring beneath it and use blanket stitch, or you could place the chocolate right side down and place the ring beneath it, and then use backstitch or another stitch of your choice.

*Next you'll want to take one of the blank chocolate shapes and start sewing that to the other side of the ring.  If you're using a blanket stitch, you'll need to leave an opening large enough to add stuffing.  If you're using another stitch, you'll need to leave enough space to turn right side in and then stuff.  Sew closed.

Zombie Valentine's Day Chocolate Box

     Let your valentine know that you love them for their brains with a zombie chocolate box.

Zombified box vs. original box.

Materials:

*Valentine's chocolate box (ideally one with ribbon or trim sewn along the box)
*Zombie fabric (such as Alexander Henry's Beauty with Brains fabric)
*All purpose adhesive
*Needle and thread
*Scissors
*Sequins
*Metallic marker

Directions:

*Carefully remove any decorations from your chocolate box.

*If your box doesn't already have holes from where trim was sewn around the edge of the box, carefully poke holes into the box about 1/2" from the edge and spaced about 1/2" apart.

*Trace the top of the box onto the part of the zombie fabric that you would like featured on your box.

*Cut out the heart shape from the fabric and place it over the top of the box.  Use a little adhesive to secure it in place.  Make sure not to glue over the holes in the box.  Let dry.

*Once the glue has dried, sew the cloth to the top of the box using the holes that were left or that you created.

*Glue sequins around the edge of the box.

DIY Zombie Valentine's Day Embroidered Throw Pillow

Front of the pillow.

     February is around the corner, which means it's time for some more zombie crafts.  If zombies aren't the ideal way to show your affection, then I don't know what is.

Back of the pillow.

Materials:

*Zombie fabric (such as Alexander Henry's Beauty with Brains fabric)
*Red fabric
*Heart patterned fabric
*Thread or embroidery floss in red, pink, green, and black
*All purpose adhesive (optional)
*Pins or safety pins
*Metallic marker
*Ruler or 12"x12" sheet of paper you don't mind marking on
*Pencil
*Stuffing

Directions:

*Cut out 12"x12" squares of the red fabric and the heart fabric.

*Cut out a zombie of your choice.  You'll want to leave about 1/4" to 1/2" of background fabric around your zombie.

*Glue or pin the zombie in place on the red fabric.  If you use an adhesive, don't glue all the way to the edge of the zombie fabric piece.  It will be harder to sew the zombie piece on if you do.

*Sew the zombie to the red fabric using a backstitch.

*Lightly write the words in pencil over the red fabric.  I winged it, but there are ways you can transfer letters to your fabric if you want them more centered or neater looking.

*Use an embroidery stitch of your choice (I opted for backstitch again) to stitch the words.  I use a pale pink thread for everything except "zombie," which I stitched in green.

*For the back of the pillow, pick some hearts that you want to turn into zombies and some that you want to have non-zombie faces.  Use black thread or floss to sew faces onto the hearts.  Use red thread or floss to add blood to the corners of some of the zombies' mouths.

*Pin the front and back sides of the the pillow together, right sides in, and sew along the edges, leaving an opening to add stuffing.

*Turn right side in and stuff.

Horror Pocket Pals Michael Myers Plushie

     I'm really excited to present my latest craft series, a set of horror themed plushies which I call Horror Pocket Pals.  The idea for this series came to me when my sister Katie told me Jacob, her boyfriend, would love something handmade and horror related for Christmas.  Jacob's favorite horror movie is Halloween, so I thought it might be fun to make him a Michael Myers plushie.  The plushie turned out pretty well, so I figured I'd try making some of my favorite horror characters too.  That's how the Horror Pocket Pals came to be.
     I plan to post one Horror Pocket Pals post a month.  Currently I have about four posts worth of material, but I have some other ideas in the works, so we'll see how it goes.

Materials:

*Brown felt
*Gray-blue felt
*White felt
*Peach felt
*Black felt
*Gray felt
*Black thread (or another color or colors of your choice)
*Scissors
*Black buttons
*Stuffing
*All purpose adhesive (optional)

Directions:

*Print out the template below.  You will probably want an t least two copies of the template to make cutting out the the felt pieces easier.


*Cut out two body pieces from peach felt, one mask from the white felt, two suits from the gray-blue felt,  two of each shoe (for four shoes total) from black felt, two knife handles from brown felt, and one knife from gray felt.  For the hair, you'll want to cut out one in the hair shape indicated and another (for the back of the head) with the back part filled in (see picture below).  (I forgot to take a picture of the pieces before I sewed a face onto the mask and did the embroidery on the suit.  Don't worry about those until later steps.)

*Sew a face onto the white mask.

*Using a backstitch or running stitch, embroider on the collar and closure Michael's outfit (see above).

*Arrange felt pieces as shown below and then sew down.  You may want to put down a few drops of glue first to hold the pieces in place while you're sewing.

*Place the two felt pieces wrong sides together and sew using the blanket stitch.  Leave an opening in the head to add stuffing.

*Stuff and sew closed.

*Sew the knife handle pieces to the knife using a blanket stitch.

*Sew the knife to Michael's hand.

Easy Shimmery Star Confetti Earrings

     I made these earrings on the spur of the moment when I realized I didn't have any sufficiently sparkly earrings for my New Year's Eve outfit.  They took me probably about ten minutes to make, and that was with me exercising some caution because my nails were still wet.  If you do some jewelry making, you probably already have most of the supplies on hand, but if not, try finding some friends who would enjoy making these earrings and go in on the craft together to reduce the cost to individuals.

Materials:

*Ear wires
*Jump rings
*Jewelry chain
*Star shaped confetti
*Sewing needle
*Jewelry pliers

Directions:

*Pick out the confetti pieces that you would like to use for your earrings.  If the confetti pieces do not already have holes in them, use the needle to poke a hole in each confetti piece so that you'll be able to attach them to the earrings.

*Using pliers, open the loop at the bottom of one of the ear wires and slide on a piece of confetti and a length of chain.  I wasn't sure how long I wanted the earrings to be, so I attached the whole chain and trimmed it down once I was almost done with the earring.

*Use jump rings to attach stars at intervals of your choosing along the wire.

*Once you've figured out where you want your earrings to end, if you haven't done so already, use the pliers to open the chain link below the final link you want included and remove excess chain.

*Add your final confetti piece and then repeat the relevant steps above to complete your second earring.

Easy DIY New Year's Eve Crown

     Ring in the new year with this easy to make sparkly crown.

Materials:

*Metallic confetti
*Floral or craft wire
*All purpose adhesive or hot glue
*Wire cutters

Directions:

*Create a loop of wire the size that you would like your crown to be.

*Cut off excess wire, leaving a little extra to glue or twist ends together to form your crown.

*Place glue along a small section of wire and dip in the confetti.  Repeat gluing and dipping until your crown is finished.

DIY Winter Hat Ornaments: Two Techniques

     These winter hat ornaments are easy to make and if you already have some yarn on hand, they cost next to nothing to make.  They're the perfect craft for holiday parties or family time.

Materials:

*Yarn
*Toilet paper tube (or cardstock)
*Ruler
*Scissors
*Pom pom (needed for one technique, but not the other)
*All purpose adhesive (needed for one technique, but not the other)

Directions:

*Cut a 1/2" tall ring from the toilet paper tube.  If you don't have an empty toilet paper roll handy, cut off a 1/2" thick strip of cardstock and glue or tape the ends together such that the cardstock forms a ring with about the same diameter as a toilet paper tube.

*Cut off a 10" length of yarn and fold it in half.

*Insert the yarn into the ring such that the loop pokes out from the bottom of the ring like this:

*Slide the ends of the yarn through the loop like this:

*Pull tight so you end up with something like this:

*Repeat until the ring is full:

*Cut off another piece of yarn and tie it around the other strands of yarn like this:

*Turn the other way:

*To finish, glue on a pom pom.

Alternate Technique

*Once you have finished tying on all the pieces of yarn, flip the other way.

*Cut off an additional length of ribbon and tie around the hat.

*Trim above the place where you tied the additional piece of yarn to create the pom pom shape.