gathered fabric flowers {tutorial}

Happy weekend!  I've been spending a lot of time these days trying to come up with crafts that perk me up (because of all the stress), and what better way than to make a bunch of flowers?!

I know, I know.... there are a billion ways to make fabric flowers nowadays (and trust me, I love every method.  I'm pretty sure I've tried every method.), but when I need to make something quick and have it look halfway decent, this is my favorite method. :)

:: Supplies I used ::

• Fabric
• Hot Glue Gun
• Scissors
• Needle & Thread
• Felt

Cut a strip of fabric.  You'll be folding this in half, and that will determine how "long" your "petal" is, so keep that in mind when deciding how wide to cut the fabric.  The wider your fabric, the bigger your petals, and the longer your fabric the bigger your overall flower will be.

Thread your needle, and create a knot at the end.  Fold the strip in half and start your sewing near the raw edge (not at the fold).  You'll notice my knotted thread, and I actually sewed around the side a couple of times to secure my knot in place (you really don't want that sucker to get out).

Sew along the raw edge in long stitches.  I kept my stitches at about half an inch.

When you've stitched the entire length of fabric, hold the thread at the end without the knot and gently start pulling your fabric towards the end with the knot.  You are 'gathering' your fabric. :)

You should end up with a scrunched up pile like this:

There are two kinds of flowers you can make from here.  You can space it out evenly and create a flat flower with space in the middle for a button or an accent:

Or you can wrap it around to create a more 3D flower:

Either way, glue it down to a piece of felt to secure the flower, and cut the remaining thread once the flower is secure.

You can try different lengths and widths of fabric to see what different variations of the flower you can make.  The dark orange and yellow fabrics were cut thinner than my light orange one, and it gave me more of a funky, zig zag petal pattern (which I liked). :)

Enjoy!