Shading, Sewing, Detailing, 3-D Piecing and Attaching Felts

After posting my latest layout titled "Out Of Shell", some of my forum friends would liked to know more about the technique used. This is actually an extension on my topic "Felt Piecing in Layouts" in my tips and tricks section. Therefore, I've thought of posting it here so that all my blog readers would also get to know more about the technique. I will answer those questions by referring to my felt piecing work in the picture below:





Shading felts:
I've used some fabric markers to shade my felt in my flower felt piecing before sewing or attaching it to the layout. You can also used some permanent art markers as long as they are not water based. This will add depths to the overall look of the flower.

Sewing felts:

I've used embroidery threads (ie. DMC) for almost all my scrapbooking work. It comes in great variety of colours and it is softer and won't tear your paper easily. It is definitely great for sewing very fragile and soft materials such as felts.

Detailing felts:
In my layout, I've used various kinds of stitching technique and colours to add depths in my felt piecing. For the dragonfly piecing and my bee piecing, I've used some vellum to create the wings which can easily be coloured using chalks or even colour pencils and markers to add more details to it.

3-D Piecing:

To do a 3-D felt piecing, you will need to duplicate some of the pieces of your felt cut outs. Then, sew them together using a sealing stitch and stuff some polyester in it before you finished sealing the whole piece.
For example, I've cut out two pieces each of the head and the body of the chick in my 3-D piecing above. I've sealed and stuffed both parts individually before sewing them together.

Attaching felts:
There are various ways to attached your felt pieces to the layout. I've used three different ways to attach my felt pieces in this layout. For bigger felt pieces such as the flower and the chicks, I've stitched it down to the layout. For medium sized felt pieces such as the small flowers and the stalks, I've used some double sided tapes to attached it. For the very small felt pieces, I've used some liquid glue which are able to attach fabric.

I hope that with this post, I've answered all the questions.