Hand sewing for kids: Heart & Star Decorations

We had so much fun making our paper plate pandas recently, that we thought we could try some more hand sewing ideas. This time we made these hand-sewn heart and star decorations.

To make them, we used:

• coloured thread
• knitters needles (bigger size so they are easier for a preschooler to handle)
• hole punch
• ribbon
• pen
• polystrene (Styrofoam) takeaway containers.

Generally I try to avoid polystyrene, but when we ordered takeaway recently and it was served in a polystyrene container, I figured we may as well upcycle the lids for craft since we can’t recycle them easily in our area. So I cut off the lids, and drew on some easy shapes – a heart for JJ, and a star for myself. Then I attached some thread (using the sticky tape trick as recommended by Make It & Love It), threaded a pair of needles and we started to sew.

The polystyrene is firm enough that JJ could hold it with one hand, yet soft enough that she could push the needle through quite easily. She could follow the heart shape easily on the drawn side, but she had to guess where to sew on the reverse side. There were (quite) a few misplaced stitches, but that’s all part of the learning process.

Once she had sewn around the whole heart, I tied off the ends. Then I cut a large circle around the heart and JJ punched a hole (using a single hole punch) at the top and threaded through some ribbon for hanging.

Here it is hanging up on our fence, alongside the star one that I made. Don’t they look pretty! We didn’t do them for any particular special occasion, but I think they would work well for party decorations hanging from a tree – they are so light that they sway in the slightest breeze.

(They could also work as a Christmas tree decorations – but I’m putting my head in the sand and totally denying that Christmas will be here in just a few months time…)

I’ll be adding this post to my Arts & Crafts for Kids page – if you’ve got a spare sec, pop over and have a look. 🙂

xx Danya