Project designed by Mary O'Neil.
Materials:
acetate-rayon velvet: an assortment of colors - this is a good time to use scraps
iron with few or no holes in the bottom
interfacing to prevent fraying of fabric
good scissors
Hot Potatoes leaf stamps
spray bottle filled with water
foam wreath wrapped in decorative ribbon
straight pins
Steps:
1. Turn the iron on the cotton setting. Lightly spray the underside of the velvet. Lay the fabric right side facing down on top of a stamp with the rubber image facing up.
2. Place the hot iron on the velvet with the stamp under it. Try to use an area of the iron where there are no steam holes. Hold the iron with pressure for about 10 to 30 seconds. Keep repeating this with various leaf designs and on various colors of velvet until you have all the leaves you need (figure A).
3. Carefully iron the velvet to the backing, but do not iron on the right side of the velvet.
4. Using your scissors cut out each leaf. This is the most time consuming part of the project, so go rent a video or watch all your Carol Duvall Show tapes you have been saving for the right time!
5. Secure a strand of floral wire to the back of each embossed leaf cutout by running a bead of tacky glue along the middle and pressing the wire into the glue to secure (figure B). Cut the wire to the size of the leaf.
6. Use straight pins to pin each leaf into the wreath in random manner (figure C). The featured project has approximately 150 leaves. Use any extra leaves to decorate packages, sweaters or even lampshades. Add berries and ribbon as accents if desired.
)
)
)
)
