DIY Fabric Pumpkins!

My kitchen table needed a little update for fall.  I have been seeing these Fabric Pumpkins around in the last year or so and wanted to make myself a few.  I finally did and I am tickled pink on how they turned out. (Or should I say tickled orange and purple?)  They make the cutest little center piece on my dining room table.  And I think I am going to make a couple for our teachers (just for fun.)

Would you like top make yourself a fabric pumpkin too?  It's so easy and you don't even need a sewing machine!

Here is how to make these pumpkins:

Materials:

• Fabric
• Pillow stuffing
• needle and thread
• hot glue
• scissors/ruler
• Something for the stem and leaves (I used sticks I found outside leaves from an old discarded fake plant, but you could use felt or fabric for the leaves (if you even want a leaf) and for the stump you could stuff a small piece of felt or fabric or use a stick from the yard or maybe even a twiste brown paper sack.)
• Twine, string or yarn to wrap around the pumpkin.
• twine, raffia, felt or extra fabric (in case you need to hide any exposed hot glue around the stem, I only needed it on 2 of my 3 pumpkins.)

Instructions:

Cut your fabric into a rectangle, different dimensions will give different shapes.  Technically, a standard pumpkin shape would be width = 2 times the height.  I wanted various shapes that would complement each other, so for reference my cut pieces were:

orange fabric:  15.5 wide by 7.5 tall

purple fabric:  32 wide by 13 tall

stripe fabric: 21 wide by 16 tall

Fold your fabric in half, right sides together and hand sew, machine sew or even hot glue the side seam.

Next, sew a wide basting stitch along the bottom of the tube.  (I tried to use my machine for this basting stitch, but it works better hand sewn since you can get a much wider stitch.)  Gather the bottom up so it is tightly closed and sew a few stitches to secure the bottom.

Flip the fabric right side out and stuff your pumpkin.  (To conserve my stuffing, I made a hole in the middle of the stuffing and used plastic bags and fabric scraps, then put stuffing on top.)

Sew a basting stitch along the top and close it the same way as the bottom.

Pull the top closed and add a few stitches to secure it.

Wrap the twine/string around the pumpkin 2 to 4 times (whatever looks best to you.) Wrap it tightly and tie it off on the bottom.  The tension gives the pumpkin the the puffiness.  If the knots at the bottom bother you, you could cut a circle of fabric/felt and hot glue it over the knots to cover them up.

Add a dollop of hot glue to the top of the pumpkin and attach your stem.

Add your leaves and twine with a little more hot glue and wallah!  A pumpkin!  Cute isn't it?

Now go make a few!

What fall sewing projects do you have lined up?


If you like this type of project and want to see more, you can follow along using the Google Friend Connect widget, through a reader, or signing up via email.  Just click on one of the icons below:

         

I will be linking up to some of the linky parties listed here, the Lettered Cottage's Autumn link party and Craftaholic Anonymous's fall frenzy link party.

Top of post

Home