
Gingerbread House Holiday Card Holder
Emily SteffenIn this festive tutorial, you’ll learn how to make a charming Gingerbread House Holiday Card Holder, perfect for adding cozy holiday cheer to your home with Emily Steffen. Shaped like a classic gingerbread house and decorated with candy-inspired details, this project is as practical as it is whimsical, giving you a sweet way to display holiday cards from friends and family. Emily will walk you through each step, with beginner-friendly instructions, a full materials list, and printable templates. Customize your card holder with your favorite colors, glitter, and faux candies to make it uniquely yours. Click here to download the free pattern.
Hello everybody and welcome to Christmas in July. Feels a little bit silly saying that, but maybe you're needing to beat the heat and you wanna celebrate a little bit of Christmas in the middle or any of your favorite holiday in the middle of the year. Um, so I have a really cool project for you today. My name is Emily Stefan, and I made or I grew up with my mom who had made this really cool or I thought it was cool, felt. Card holder that hung on our wall so every time we opened up a holiday card, we would tuck the card in the little pockets and sadly enough, it was made out of polyester felt and she had made it with the sequins, probably she made it in the 70s or 80s.
I don't even know, but it is like since disintegrated this last year was kind of its last year, so I thought, hey. I want to make a new version of this. I'm gonna make my own version of it. I wanna make it with wool felt so that it lasts and stands the test of time and just kind of feels nostalgic and substantial. And so I made a gingerbread house card holder that has slots in the sections of the gingerbread house or the tiers or the I don't know, levels or the stories of the gingerbread house for you to slip your cards in.
This is 5 by 7 in size. So any size card can either stick out the top or it can go right in, so you go all the way in so you still just see the whole thing or maybe you wanna have them stick out. I'm not sure. But this is my version of this gingerbread card holder that my mom had made, and there's so many customizations you can do to it. I wanna walk through today how you can kind of make it or how you can kind of approach it and then you can run with it and make it perfect for your family.
Hopefully it has this really cool awesome thing that you put up every single year, um, and it's July, so if you could start. on it now, the chances of finishing it before the holiday season is really high. I love projects like this that can kind of just, you can sit down and pick back up and that's a project like this. So before I get started though, I want to tell you that the full pattern which has all the instructions, all the tips, all the cutting out things is in the link. So to download that, it's a PDF and I just wanna tell you a couple things about the pattern.
Um, the pattern is a little bit bigger than the one I've made here. So as you're kind of reading through the pattern, if you're like, oh, I don't want to do that or I want to change this or I want to make it bigger or smaller, feel free to just use the pattern as sort of a guide to make it however you want, um, and honestly, even when I was cutting this out. I'm like, oh, do I wanna make it like a traditional gingerbread color? Do I want to make it white like a candy house would be a lot more colorful. I chose just the gingerbread sort of colors, but truthfully take the pattern, take the things I'm saying in the pattern in all the written instruction and just run with it.
I would totally encourage you to do that. Also there's a chat box where you can throw in questions, comments, concerns, thoughts, ideas, things you love to do for the holiday season, things you're looking forward to for the holiday season and things you're crafting now for the holiday season. um, I was flipping through the channels the other day. And there's a lot of holiday movies on for Christmas in July, so maybe you wanna just share your Christmas in July moments, but make sure you can jot anything down in um the comments. I will read them.
I'll answer them we can interact with each other. That's the cool thing about these events being live is we can totally. Um, interact with each other and have a conversation. So in the pattern you will see, I'm gonna get started. Um, also, first of all, to head off any questions I'm using 8020 felt.
I love it. I will stand by it. It's one of my most favorite kind of felts. It's 80% wool, 20%. I'm sorry, 80% rayon, 20% wool.
It's not like the polyester wool that you'd get at your local craft store, um, or not often sometimes big box stores will have. Yardage you can cut that it will look like this where it's like on the yard generally if something's on the yard or on the bolt that where you know where it's a bolt, it'll be uh some sort of wool blend. The thing that I like about wool blends is, is this is just my opinion and totally take it for what it is. Maybe you want to jot down your own comment about your felt choices. The thing I like about wool blends is a.
Colors feel less synthetic or less fake. They're still bright and happy and wonderful, but they feel like they're more dyed because they are so they're less like neon green and and more like a beautiful subtle green, and they don't stretch like some of the polyester wool that you get if you've ever worked with wool before, specifically if you're trying to teach kids to to sew or something. Wool stretch or uh polyester felt stretches and can get like deformed or unshapen I guess if you wanna say. So for a project like this, when you have the sides sewn and you're tucking and pulling and putting things in and pulling things out, this will hold its shape. The wool will keep its shape because it's, it's wool.
It's a, it's a it's a natural fiber if you will. So I mean the rayon isn't but. That's what gets it so that it's not like super scratchy and icky and thick and gross like a wool blazer or something. So that's my, that's what I love. Sometimes they're 70/30, sometimes they're 60/40.
I often just gravitate towards the 80/20, but the 70/30 is fine. Any sort of wool blend is what I would recommend because it will keep its shape. It'll last longer. It won't disintegrate sort of like polyester can over time, um, so that's what I'm using. Like I said, I chose the traditional, I guess, gingerbread color.
And um so so what I've done full transparency, I didn't want to start from scratch on the project because it would have taken 9 zillion years and nobody wants to sit here through a live event for 9 zillion years so here let me grab this little I wanna explain to you it says it in the pattern, so if you don't have the pattern download it, um. So here, OK, here. So right here there's 1234. All the all the written instructions are in here. All the actual pattern pieces are after that.
So there's two sort of things you need to cut 1234 panels and then I'm gonna flip this over so you can see it. This back piece. So this back piece right here is one big piece and then I've cut. The 123, and I guess the top I you only really cut the roof line so it's one big rectangle and then 123 and then the roof line. So you need, I don't know, I used about less than I should have and totally regretted my decision because this is a really good color.
Um, I use, what did I even say in the pattern? I should know this. Hang on, hang on, let me check. I used, OK, so it's like 25 by 10 for the gingerbread color and then it's another, um, this is 15 or 2020. This is 20 inches because these are 5 inches high, 15, and then this additional piece.
So I don't know probably I would say by a half of a yard or around that because this will be the length of what a half of a yard is or you could do a yard, 3/4 of a yard, that should be about right, even if you have to have this long piece and two panels, it should work. And then the backing. Be whatever color you want it to be. This is, I, it's 1 inch and a half on the top, bottom and sides. Probably looks more like 2 inches, but it should have been 1.5-ish, so I maybe cut it a little bit big.
There's no precision, I feel like with a project like this, which I appreciate. So like I said, use the pattern, follow the instructions, but make it your own, and the beginning of the base of it is one big rectangle and then you're working in these panels. So I've cut out my rectangle, I've worked my panels and my top, and I want to show you just all my tips and tricks on how I'm gonna do each panel. And this is where it becomes really fun because you can set it down and pick it back up and it's a fun project for Christmas in July because you can turn on a movie in the heat of the afternoon or whatever turn on a book or something and work on this and there's a million different ways. If you choose to glue, great, if you choose to hand stitch, great.
If you choose the machine stitch, awesome. There's no one way to do this. I chose to do a combination of multiple different ways to do it so um yeah, I'm gonna show you how to do that first let me check all these questions. um, Austria, Sandy's coming in from Austria. She says she hasn't started on Christmas things yet.
Since it's since it's been almost Christmas temperatures out this entire week I'm still firmly logged in to creating summer things. Amen. Sometimes you just wanna do the opposite of what the season is and Don, hi Dawn, happy to see you too. This is lovely. I love when we have people that just keep chiming in.
This is great. um OK, so I chose for this project to kind of baste with glue and then stitch with um just like a quilting thread, just like a quilting cotton thread. But where's my pattern piece? Here it is. Hang on, I have it.
This is what happens when you have 900 things at your desk. OK, so each one of the the panels will come as the panel. I would highly encourage you to cut out your panel and then cut out the individual pieces kind of like this because then you're able to to um attach them, pin them to your fabric a lot easier. So cut out your panels and then cut out your individual shapes. So I'm gonna work on the door today and you can.
Eliminate pieces of the door. I wanna do the background of the door and then have the little rim and then have the little slatties and then the little like flourishes. This was kind of the flourishes are kind of a I guess a nod to some like Norwegianesesque sort of architecture. I don't know. You'll also notice, maybe you've noticed this already, that I got to cutting out my wreath and I decided I didn't want the flourishes on the inside, so I just have a wreath that goes outside.
So, do with it what you want. OK, I'm gonna do all of my uh door outlines are in white, so I'm gonna continue that. And I will roughly cut just like a chunk. Oh, this is really, it's probably got folded cause it's a little bit. Um, wrinkly, but that's OK.
Cut a rough shape. Out of my white and whenever I'm cutting something that's a little bit more intricate, I try to go big to small just because I feel like that works really well you maybe have the same thoughts. I'm not sure, but so I'm going to pin this on for the lady who doesn't pin that often. I tend to pin intricate things because I wanna make sure that they. Work well.
I just taught my daughter how to pin to fabric, and this is how I taught her in case you're feeling overwhelmed by pinning stick it through almost to the knob, pinch it like a taco like right like this, an upside down taco, and then just poke it and she did really well. She, she started, um, hand stitching some stuff this week and I've always pinned for her and I was pretty impressed. So again, the sharpest part of your scissors is always gonna be the inside part or the tip. Generally, not always, so I try and open it really wide, like an alligator mouth. It's how I tell kids to do it.
And I never go the length of the whole entire blade just because I feel like sometimes that I get those jagged, not clean edges. OK, so this is what I mean by going big to small. I did the biggest section, right? I'm gonna take this off. Lay it on, go, OK, is that right?
Do I need to trim it because my patterns are not always perfect. OK, this is a weird little. Not smooth area here. Tara. The cool thing about felt is that it's like those old felt boards and it's sticky, so you don't, I don't pin a lot felt the felt.
OK, then I want to do this. Um, so, so this part is gonna be white, but this inside part I want to be this brown, this, I don't know, mustard color, so. I will cut. This mustard color. Checking to make sure we don't have any questions.
And I'll just cut off the part that I just did. Cause it's already been cut out of the white, oops. Cutting can be so. Mesmerizing sometimes, which I love. All right, so that's set aside.
See, so now when I place this on here, rather than cutting out the inside and then cutting out the white as like a separate thing and you hope they line up, you hope your cuts are right, I do a lot of layering with felt so the same thing is with this this with my window, I cut out the background out of the mustard. And then I cut out the white and then I cut the middle out and actually rather than making sure these little tiny squares I just cut two strips way easier and layer them and it's not like it's adding a ton of bulk. I don't feel like it. I mean maybe if you have like 50 layers of felt that might feel complicated, but it just feels like it. Works well and then you're not having to have perfect precise cuts that stress you out if they do not line up too much.
Um, OK, so next. I, I wanna leave this top part of the door, this brown, and then I'm gonna do the gingerbread color for the slats or maybe every other. So I'm actually just gonna cut it off. So that I can do the little flourishes out of pink, cause that'll match up here or out of that purpley color. So.
Scraps. Look at, this is the, the negative space of that up there. So I'm gonna use it. And I'm not going to, this doesn't need to be super precise, so I'm not actually gonna pin it. I'm just gonna use my, I don't know, squishy, squishy fingers.
Your claw hand To hold it I do wanna make sure that they stay next to each other, but because it's kind of supposed to look like an old door, I don't need them to even line up super properly, so. And I think if you see some of the um felt through it, it's not gonna be that big, that big of a deal. It might actually be cool. Maybe I should cut some negative space in there so I can see. Through the slats, that might be cool.
I'm gonna trim this guy a little bit. And I'm gonna trim some of these so that we have. A little bit of space. And if you notice and you look really closely, I didn't choose to sew everything on. So for instance, this um stem is just.
Glued on, babasted. I started by basting it and then I realized like, hey, I actually don't want stitch marks around absolutely everything, especially those intricate little pieces so it might make sense for these slats actually not to be glued on because then it will give. More of a like, I don't know, less sewn look to it. Tada, so that's the slats of the door. And then I'm gonna do um the little flourishes, and these are out of pink, pinkishy purple, which I have scraps of.
Right here. And I'm gonna do this to make my life easier. If you are feeling like you have thoughts or ideas or inspiration on how you would make yours, I'd love to hear it because I really hemmed and hot about my color color way. Shocker, I know if you know me, color is a big deal. So I went back and forth of do I want traditional?
do I not? How do I want, how do I want my gingerbread to look? Where is it gonna hang in my house? How close is it gonna be to my Christmas tree? because that's super colorful.
I feel like a traditional gingerbread house was the way to go, even though there's not usually flowers, but it's a little bit Nordic, I guess. And then these little deals. And I'll show you my two stitching styles or two stitches um that I use to kind of assemble all of this. And Oops, I think that's backwards and it's far too big. So I didn't really follow the pattern.
OK. So. Sometimes I feel like on these little guys I need to. There we go. All right, I'm gonna clean these up a little bit.
Oh, somebody is joining us from Kazakhstan. Holy moly. That is amazing. Hi, I'm so glad you're here. What are you crafting for Christmas in July?
Or your holidays in July. OK, so this is where my door is at. This is what every single one of my panels looked like before I started attaching anything. I'm gonna clean up my little scraps here and like I said, the cool thing about felt is that it sticks to each other like an old felt board or felt felt gram or whatever those were called. So, um, again, I'm gonna work from big to small, so start attaching it if you wanna use, this is my favorite felt glue.
It's the Felt and foam tacky glue from Mele's. The reason I love it is because it's nice and thick and it actually has like, Enough substance to not just soak into the felt because sometimes if you use non-felt glue and you just use regular fabric glue it's so um thin that it just soaks right in and it just makes the fabric stiff and this stuff, it does make the fabric a little stiff if you gob it on, but I mean I've, I've um glued all these other things in place and it's still nice and flexible. So this highly recommend this glue. I don't get paid by them. I just really love the glue.
Maybe you have your favorite. If you have your other favorite glue, let us know. OK, so what I'm gonna do first is I'm actually um gonna decide what I want to only glue in place. Also, if you wanna use hack glue you can. The the reason I don't use hack glue that much in crafting is because it's chunky, it's plastic.
It's essentially melted plastic and it's gonna make it nice and kind of crusty. I don't like it. Um, I'm gonna choose to glue. These slats down, glue these down, and then I'll probably just like bas glue baste this in place. And what I mean by that is when you're sewing and you're doing traditional sewing, basting means it's just kind of a loose stitch that you easily can take out later on.
It just kind of holds two pieces together without having to pin them. I'm using glue as a basting. Some people use an actual glue stick that might work. I feel like. Whatever you feel like you wanna do.
Do it please but um and the reason I'm choosing to glue based is because pins are long and to try and like have to pin something like this, I would, I don't, it just would be really tricky because you're trying to sew around it when the length of the pin is longer than the piece that you're trying to sew around in general. So these little pieces I'm just gonna add a little bit of a dab just to get it to stick. So that life is easier. This also makes it, let me just give you a plug for, for glue basting. If when you glue-based or if you decide to stitch base, that would be fine too.
It would just be a little bit more work, um. It makes it very mindless to be able to like put on a movie or listen to a book and not have to concentrate as much. So, so just a thought for you. um I'm gonna pull this off because I want to make sure that these are nice and level and then I can trim the bottom because remember I did cut those a little bit, but I'm going to not stitch these, so I'm gonna add a little bit more glue than I normally would. You can see kind of how thick this glue is.
It's um. Yeah. Here we go, it's really, it's one of my favorites. I've used a lot of glues, and it's my favorite, hands down. Cause it's not crunchy, but it's nice and thick.
So. I'll do this quick. Do you have any questions? Oh, can I add extra Quin? OK, this is a really good question, Quinn.
Quinn is asking, can I add extra pockets to hold more cards? 900%. The way this pattern is built is on these different sections. Literally all you'd have to do is make more sections. Maybe you just repeat more windows in them, maybe you add more candy canes, maybe you want to do gumdrops or some sort of like those swirly mint candies on them or something, however you want to customize this.
Would be amazing. I just followed the three pockets because that's what I had and that's the kind of the space or the length on the wall where I know I'll hang it, but yeah, you can make it bigger, wider, longer, you could even make it smaller if you wanted to only do one pocket and have it for like little treasures on your Christmas tree or something. I don't know, but yes, absolutely you 100% can add extra pockets if you know you are so loved by your family and you get a million cards in the mail. Isn't that lovely? That would be.
It is kind of great to open up non-bills at the holiday season. The only downside of this glue, the only downside of this glue is it's so thick that if it's not near the tip, it just takes forever to get the glue to move down there, or you have to like squeeze it to high heavens. So sometimes. When you store it, store it upside down. Hot tip OK.
So this is on, oops, this is not straight. There we go. I can see my slats. I'm gonna flip her over, give her a trim. Wipe off my scissors.
Some of my extra fabrics I don't want glue on my scissors. So if you ever cut something that's gluey, grab an extra piece of fabric and just wipe it off before that glue hardens, because otherwise it's gonna ruin. Um, how sharp your scissors are. OK. So, here's this guy right here.
This is my door. This is where I'm at. I feel like it, yeah, looks like a little gingerbread door, huh? I am going to show you the two stitches that I use. I use a running stitch or Yeah, no, I'm sorry, not a running stitch, a whip stitch, excuse me, to to tack things down and then I use a blanket stitch to tack multiple things together.
So to use a whip stitch, I use this is just like nylon, it's really um it's it's hand quilting thread. It's really strong. I'm just using white because that's just what I have. Just thread your needle, whatever needle you want. And oh Lord.
Smallest eye of the needle that I possibly could have found. Oh I feel like I'm getting to the like. I can't just thread a needle without looking more stage of my life. I used to be able to just do it all the time. So I don't ever put knots in the end of my threads because I just don't.
Instead, if you've ever seen me do any hand stitching, you know that I do two Xs. On the back to anchor my stitch. So if I'm. Putting these two together, I'm gonna make a stitch all the way around and then I might actually stitch these on but essentially what I'm gonna be doing is whip stitching, meaning I'm going up, up, up or down, down, down. I like to go down rather than up but either way you go either up, up, up or down and down, whatever you decide, and what I'm doing is if you look super close, you see that on.
The top of the fabric you see like a little dash, so it'll be like dash dash dash dash dash, but what I'm doing with my needle is I'm actually gonna go up with my needle and then when I'm up with my needle right here and then when I'm going down, I'm almost like angling, this is probably not angling my needle like this so that I don't get. The um the length of my stitch on anything other than the top of my fabric. If that makes any sense. So I'm gonna show you how to do that. So I'll anchor my stitch.
By making an X, so I insert just on the back and I make 1 X. Or letter T, however you want to describe it, and another one, and this is. Like I'm pulling. Listen, can you hear? I'm pulling, it's super strong.
I think it's stronger than knots and you don't have the bulk of knots. Any hand quilter will teach you that. Actually, I'm going to. Just add a pin to this really quickly. Just in the center.
Tara, OK. So I'm going to go. Up through the slat, all the way up, straight needle, not angled, straight needle, like 90 degree angle up, but then when I go back down, I'm gonna go angle it inward towards underneath. So up straight up. And then angle it back down towards like like I'm angling it towards the underneath of the door so that I'm not getting much of my white thread onto my white background.
I white background you can't see it that much, but on my brown background you still can't see my thread on my brown. You can only see the thread on my white. Does that make sense? Doesn't make sense. Please say something in the comments.
Now, stitching like this means you can't, some people when they hand stitch end up folding their fabric and they can that's not how this is. Um, I just really like the look of it better. Now also, here's another thing to note. I use my thumb because I know I'm kind of, uh, to make your stitches look the most amazing on the actual planet you're going to just make them look as even as possible, as evenly spaced out as possible, as even width as possible so I use uh a a part on my thumbnail to know how far apart my stitches should be. If you want to make a little mark on your thumbnail, please do that.
I feel like I just know kind of where my little thumbnail part is that I'm stitching. Um, I'm still able to stitch pretty fast, but I'm not I'm not able to fold and go. It's, it's just a lot slower of a stitch, but I feel like it looks so clean. So see all this is probably hard to tell. You can only see my stitches on the brown, you cannot see them on the white.
So it looks like you're essentially like tacking it down, if that makes sense, but it's still a really strong whip stitch. If that doesn't make sense, please say something in the comments. So I'm gonna go around. OK, I do have a couple of comments and questions coming in. Um, oh, Miss P says she's an awesome teacher.
Thank you. You guys are so great. I should do this every day so you can just be amazing and tell me how great this is. Um, OK, are there any ideas for turning this into an advent calendar? Oh, Katherine, that's so fun.
You know, OK, here's my thoughts on this, and if you have any other thoughts, please chime in. Here's what you could do. You could shrink this pattern down like shrink it, you know how like on your printer you can go to like. I don't know 25% or 10% or something just to get your dimensions and you could make the um the base of the the the cardholder wider and do littler pockets. That would be so cute.
I didn't even think of that and a felt advent calendar we have one. I made one a long time ago, um, sort of from a kit but then I ended up deviating from the kit, um, where it's, it is felt the background is a big piece like this and then it's rose instead of instead of big chunks like this it was rose and what there's 25 because you go to Christmas Eve question mark, yeah, I think so there's 25? There must be because it's 5 rows and then there's and then. I sewed 5 vertical lines, so they just created pockets and then I made little tiny stuffies so it's like little stars, little mittens, little snowflakes, you know, you just take 3 million years to stitch those little things and added sequins and beads because of course I had to do that and then my kids, um, above the pocketed area is a tree and then they put it on the tree. I think Pearl Soho.
Had a kit that I, I think it was Pearl Soho in New York City, um, that I bought, but then I ended up deviating from it because I didn't love all the colors and I wanted to make it way more colorful and festive and we created other stuffies but. This whole idea is perfect for an advent calendar and let me say this, that's also out of felt, um, and it's the ran wool felt, and it has lasted my kids tug on. I mean when they were little they were tugging those things out of there and it lasts so well. I embroidered numbers in a bright pink on each one of the little. Uh, sections or or pockets.
So take this idea and you can totally make a gingerbread house admin counter. That'd be so cute. You could even put little like stuffed candies in there or something, or maybe real candies and they just eat it. I don't know. Um, OK, thank you for the info.
I love the class. I have a special needs daughter and she's always making gifts for members at church. Oh yes, the cool thing about, um, a project like this is that it, I know I say this all the time whenever I'm hand stitching, it makes you slow down. It makes you think about what you're doing about if this is a gift and who you're making it for and. A comment like that just warms my heart because I feel like people who make handmade gifts are just so thoughtful and beautiful and wonderful and amazing because you're like you sat down and you made this thing for me for me not just in general, but for me and you everything you did was for me it I yeah I think it's really beautiful so yay, that's a that's amazing.
OK, here's a thought because I'm hand stitching around my door, you see my little stitches, and I want to do these since I'm here, I could also jump in here and do these and then finish and I have enough thread to do that. So that is exactly what I'm gonna do and what I mean by that is I'm gonna start stitching these little guys and you probably can see whoops, exactly what I mean, my tail is a little long when I show you. How I'm angling inward, you're not seeing my white on this brown or this gingerbread color at all because I'm angling to underneath that pink. Color, does that make sense? I hope it makes sense.
Because There, right? You see that? That's the beauty of, of having a slower stitch that isn't, I don't know what this is called. Um, I'm sure it's just a variation of a whipstitch. If somebody knows, can you please put it in the comments because I feel like I should know this.
This is attached enough. I don't need this on here anymore. But I'm gonna keep working this door. And Um, one of the thing that I should say, that I know I mentioned briefly, uh, if, if you don't wanna stitch at all and only wanna leave this glue, that's totally fine. That's what I'm doing with these.
I'm not gonna stitch these on. And the reason I'm stitching, um, but the one thing I didn't say is the reason I'm stitching these things individually before I'm gonna jump over here. I do anything else is what I, what I want to avoid and and maybe think about this, especially if you decide to add any sequences or beads or anything. What I want to avoid if possible is any stitching that will show on the back of the pocket only because that's the thing that could get um caught on the edge of a card or something. So if you're deciding to add beads or sequins or even if you want to add like puffy paint details, I guess puffy paint details are different, but I would encourage you to do that all separately on these individual things before you attach here.
So for instance if I wanted to add beads or embroidery or flourishes or anything um on my door, I would do it now rather than doing it once the door is attached because it leaves less like my goal, you can see a little bit here. All I have is a few stitch marks and um anchors anchor spots on the back because I wanted to avoid any edges, loose ends. Or loose threads that would only catch on something you put on the inside of that and that would be the same if you're gonna turn this into an advent calendar just think about um think about that with the construction I would say as you're doing it or as you're thinking through. Uh, what you're adding. OK, I'm gonna start with this.
I'm gonna start with this. Cause I want to show you the blanket stitch, but I wanna make sure this is all attached first. See, I have a lot more stitch. You probably can't see that on the back of this. I'm a lot less careful, which is totally fine.
I love also the way that the stitch pulls the felt to the felt. I feel like it almost becomes one, which is almost like actual felting if you've ever done actual felting. OK, I'm almost done. I'm almost done. Um, OK, Rebecca says I'm thinking of ways of adapting this project for birthdays, like a birthday cake to display my kids' birth.
That's a super good idea. You know I've always thought another thing that could be really cool, especially for birthdays, is a birthday countdown. I mean maybe adults wouldn't be as into it as kids would be, but birthday cards, thing about birthdays is they make you feel so special, so I love this thought. Because a birthday cake would be so fun because you could do it, you know, different, I don't know, a tiered birthday cake or something like that with the numbers that you could switch out on the top of the cake, kind of like the advent calendar, meets the birthday cake holder or the cake holder. This has now got my brain going.
How would you make that would be really cool because it could be a tiered birthday cake. Where you put the cards in and then you put add the numbers at the top, you know, like little mini stuffed numbers or something, you know, like you get the gold numbers at the, I don't know, store, Target or the dollar store or whatever for the that are candles, that'd be super cute. Rebecca, you're a genius. Now you've got my wheels turning. Cause my kids would love that and um my mother-in-law actually sort of has, I feel like I don't know, cards are her love language and she displays them on her fireplace and I always thought, well, that's a little bit weird, but.
The I mean she also writes these gorgeous heartfelt meaningful things inside of her cards which make you just feel so loved and special and appreciated so of course you want to display them and that would be a really fun way. OK, I lied. I don't have quite enough quite enough thread, but here's, let me, this is great because I can show you how I end this and how I would start something else. So, well, first of all you can see that this isn't completely centered so I can trim this if I want to, but if you have uh not enough thread. The way that I anchor my stitch is exactly the way I start my stitch.
I make two Xs. And it's really tight without pulling on the front, trim it nice and close, and then just start the exact same way. So I will show you this. And this can lead into stitching it onto the outside, and then we're gonna, I'm gonna show you my blanket stitch. This is a Small as a needle.
Eye of the needle ever. I don't know why I chose this one. If you feel comfortable doing knots, do knots. I just don't like them. So start my stitch.
And it's an X and I'm not going all the way to the front. I don't know if I said that before. But X or T, letter X or letter T, whichever you want. It's quite sturdy. It's quite sturdy.
Whenever, um, I think it's a hand quilting thing where you don't do knots because if you have knots in the middle of your quilt, you just have a ball of bunchy stuff in the middle of your quilt and that's no bueno. So, OK, I'm almost done getting the door. And every time um you stitch, I think things move just a little bit. So I'm gonna trim up this door just a tiny oops. And that's OK.
And actually I'm not going to end this, uh, this thread because I'm just gonna stitch the door onto. The panel. So here's what I'm gonna do, leave it, look at it and go, well, shoot, it's a little bit bigger on this side, so I'm just gonna eyeball it. And trim Haha. Much better.
And this is also off a teeny bit, so I'm gonna flip this over so I can see this straight edge. Ta da. There we go. So now this is going, again, if I want to baste in place with um glue I can. I'm not I'm choosing not to.
But what I am gonna do here is put a pin in this really quickly. And then quickly go around the edge of this with the same. I don't have to worry about the bottom because I will show you how I'm going to stitch that. Who here. Another thing that would be really fun too that you can think about, I mean, if you have kids or if you have other family members is I thought about this as I was doing this, how fun would it be to send your kids if they don't live with you or whatever, um.
Send them each the fabric and have them each make a panel and then you could put it together for a family gingerbread house or something so maybe each one represents each family member or something or each kid could work on it. I thought about that after I had this all designed and cut out. I thought, oh my gosh, my daughter would have loved to get involved with this project because it gives her ownership and then maybe, I don't know, maybe she would wanna. Have some part in putting it up every year or something. I don't know that could be really cool.
OK, I do have a question that came in from Clara. What is the best way to keep motivated for going for crafting over several months for the holidays? OK, if you have any thoughts on that. I feel like for me um access is super key so I feel like whenever I put something away like not within I shot it is like out of sight out of mind that's a big thing for me so we have a for a project like this because it would be something I could put down and pick back up again we have a just like a a croc side table thing that's kind of by our fireplace that. Has a chair on it or chair by it and I often will stuff projects in that croc like in a bag going oh it's it's here and then it's like put away and it's it's it's not cluttering our our living room.
Well that's lovely except then I don't see it ever so what I've found is if I keep it on the table I'm more likely to pick it up and you know do a little bit of stitching every night. But I don't know. Does anybody else have any thoughts on that? Because, um, I, I don't, I feel like when I get excited about something, I plow through it. Like this project when I got the idea, I designed it, printed it, figured it out, started doing it.
Yeah, but, but sometimes holiday projects are a lot or maybe give yourself little goals like, hey, I want to finish the stitching by the end of next week and make sure you've carved time time carved out for it. I, I like to craft at night a lot, um, because I feel like it's a relaxing if I'm not drawing at night, I'm usually crafting because it's just the the thing that relaxes me a lot as we're kind of winding down for the evening. Um, yeah. How, but I mean, look at the cute gingerbread house. Why would you not want to finish it?
Maybe if it's felt and it's 400 degrees outside, don't bring it outside and work it on your lap. Sandy, OK, Sandy, do you have a thought? Sandy says, how about using the basic idea of a house as a template then make various pockets. Yes, fitting the seasons or holidays of the year instead of sewing them on, putting snaps on the back. Well, I mean that sounds amazing.
So you'd have like. Um, haunted house, like the little panels would be a haunted house or a Valentine's candy castle or a birthday cake or something like that. That would be a really good idea. OK, I'm almost done with this. I'm almost done with this.
See, stitching takes forever. But it is relaxing, I think. Another thought about that, the question um that Claire asked about staying motivated is I do think also if a project if the if the um. The process of the project I enjoy, it's more likely that I'll finish it. Like if you hate hand stitching, don't start hand stitching this project, glue it, get it done faster.
If you love hand stitching, I love picking up hand stitching at night and stitching. So that's maybe something to consider is the process of what you're doing. Make sure you like it. And that it gives you gratification as you go. I'm almost done.
But truthfully, this little bit of the door is probably all I would. Have time or motivation for at the end of the day. So little bits at a time. Like I think I did each window 11 time each night, you know, as you sit down. Something like this is easy to break up into sections.
Knitting, a lot of knitters do that too. You break it up into sections. Knitting just takes a lot more concentration. I knit, but I don't knit that much because I feel like I'm constantly counting and dropping stitches and having to concentrate and then I can't listen to the movie I'm watching. OK.
Another thing I did not say if you want to use a sewing machine to sew some of these easy parts on, please do. I do have a sewing machine for the edging here which I don't know that I'm fully going to get to to demonstrate, but um to be able to show you, I will visually show you the next steps again they're in the patterns so if you ever feel tripped up by something, it's all written out and there's there's photos, um, but this is just the, you know, that I hope I get you excited about it and get your wheels turning on something you can do. OK, here's some comments. Yara says, you know, I used to get so overwhelmed by trying to finish my holiday crafts all at once, and I started this little trick. Every time I finish a small part of my project, I treat myself to something fun.
Like after finishing a set of ornaments, I enjoy my favorite chocolate or watch an episode of a show I love. Love this, love this. Sometimes it's it if it's a big milestone even surge on a new craft tool or set of markers. All right, Yara, you need to be my neighbor. That is absolutely perfect.
That is exactly it, little moments. And then she also says those little words keep me excited and give me something to look forward to besides just the crafting itself. I think that can be true when you're making something for others when you're like, oh this isn't something that I necessarily love but somebody else loves that is really cool. It really helped me pace myself and actually enjoy the process. That is half of crafting is enjoying the process and you want to make sure that, yeah, you're really into it.
OK. Oh, guys, I have like 10 stitches left. Here we go. You can see that it's like, you know, little dash marks. I just really love the way hand stitching looks like so much.
And every little, I feel like it's strong, it's not just glued on, it's not just gonna come off. But it's a preference. It doesn't need to if you are like, I loathe hand stitching, please do not hand stitch, just glue it on. It's not gonna make it any less cool of an of a finished product. I 100% promise you that.
OK, so this panel is almost done and by almost done I mean I have all my, um, you know, like elements of what the panel is supposed to be. So I'll anchor my stitch and then we're going to get to attaching it to the whole background and I decided, um, I'm gonna anchor this quick. This is what I'm using here is just this quilting cotton, right? Or the quilting nylon nylon thread. If you want to use something different, please do.
Made my ex's give it a trim, but when I'm attaching my panels, I'm using a thicker needle with a bigger eye because I'm using this is, I don't know what this is, this is just 100% pearl cotton. It's thinner than embroidery floss, so it'd almost be like one. Strand of the embroidery flask, but it's like thick like thread. I don't even know it's from the craft store. I have a zillion colors.
I think they come in packs or you can buy them individually, but that is what I love because I love the color. I love the ad of like the little bit more chunky of a um of a sort of look to it. So here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna show you how I'm gonna attach the panels. And then show you how I'm gonna how I would attach the panel to the background and the background of the whole thing.
So this has very few stitches that are obvious in it, but I'm going to pin this in place. I want to make sure my edges are all lined up again, if you just want to run a bit of glue along the edge like hot glue or something, please do that. You do not have to stitch this. I just really like the look of it. I like the way that it's gonna look when I'm all done.
So to make my blanket stitch. Um, you can choose to finish the top and go around all four corners. I'm just gonna go around the outside 3 corners of this. And we're a little bit of running out of time, so please comment if any of these stitchings don't make sense to you. I would love to make sure that you do not leave with questions.
Um, oh, Katherine says she also, this is another answer to the how do you stay motivated moment. I keep an inspiration board of colors and patterns when I'm stuck looking that always gives me fresh ideas you decided to craft again. You can also use Pinterest in that way, like 100% you can use Pinterest. OK, little tip here. I don't, um, I know that a card is gonna go in here, but the back of this is gonna be stuck to this.
I'm choosing to anchor my stitch on the back of this, not on the inside. Normally I would say anchor your stitches and finish your stitches on the inside of what you're doing so they get tucked in, but in this case don't do that because things will get put in here and again you want as as few things as possible for your for your paper to get stuck on. So I'm going to whoops, well, I pulled that all the way through. Anchor my stitch with the letter T or letter X 2 times, however. When I mean letter X, I'm going like this and like this.
That's what I mean by making the letter. I'm not actually like embroidering a letter in there. OK, it's really strong. This is pinned in place. I'm going to go to start a blanket stitch.
A blanket stitch means it's like this where you can see the stitch along the side and it looks like a whip stitch on the front. To start a blanket stitch, I'm gonna go up. And make a loop so I'll go up in the same hole again because I wanna make the loop around the edge, but I want my uh uh yarn thread whatever coming from this side so it's pulling across the edge. So then I'm gonna stick my needle right through. So that now my thread kind of looks like you're making a knot is essentially on this side.
So that when I do my up before I pull it all the way through, so I'm leaving a little bit of a loop. I'm gonna stick. This looks confusing. My needle threw it, and that's my blanket stitch. So again, you want to make it even, as even as possible.
And then stick My needle through it. I'm gonna continue this all the way around these three edges, and if you want to finish the top, you can. Totally, I did not finish the top on any of these other ones because I just didn't think it was super necessary. But again, you're gonna make sure everything is nice and even. And it looks like a whip stitch because all you have are the dashes on the top, but if you turn it to the side, it's a finished edge.
I like doing the stitch when you're when you're finishing an edge because I feel like it cleans your edges up, it makes the thread look really nice. Um, you can, if you really wanted to, you could grab the this. In your, um, the tip of it in your looping. I don't wanna do that. I'm just gonna glue this whole thing to the background of the pink.
You can stitch on it with a sewing machine. You could stitch on with a sewing machine in one. Um, long, I think I note this in the pattern. If you don't want to do your blanket stitch on the edge, lay everything out, pin it, and then use your sewing machine to run a stitch along the edge, catching the edge, the back, and the background all in one shot because that would be another way to finish it. Again, find what you like, find what gets you excited, find the way that you want it to look, and then finish it off.
I wanted this to be really stitched looking, so I'm choosing. The blanket stitch. Now, I'm gonna pause for a second because we're running a little bit low on time, um. And I want to explain to you how I'm gonna finish the edge of this. So, I would finish my blanket stitch, and then the next thing I'm gonna do is take only one.
There's remember there's two panels here. I would take one panel. And Add my loops at the top. So in theory I wanted to have a. Dowel holding the top of my.
Panel, but I needed some sort of this is just folded over 2 inches. They're really long because I didn't know how long I needed to have them or maybe you don't know how long you need to have them, but essentially I'm gonna explain this to you and again you can use Hau you don't have to do anything super specific, but essentially what this is gonna be is here I'm gonna get this all together and I'm gonna flip it so it's upside down. So just imagine it's not upside down. This will be attached to the top layer only. And these.
We go Right in here so that you dowel. Can slide in. Does that make sense? And I um am not sure I know exactly where I wanna hang this just because I know where I wanna hang it, but it maybe I wanted to make them really long so it's more of like a looser flag or maybe I wanna make them shorter. Either way I wanted them to be a little bit chunky wide so that's why they're 2.5 inches wide, um, or excuse me, 2 inches wide by the length and then all I will do.
Let's take some ribbon. And then hang this, so it's just an easily kind of simple hung. Thing on my wall, it's not super huge, but again you can make it wider you make, you know you could probably make multiple houses if you always get a ton of cards. That's the gist of finishing it. I'm so sorry that I didn't get to finish it completely on camera.
Again, everything is written in the instructions, shown in the instructions. This is the kind of basic idea. Take what you want to do and finish it the way you want to. Like if you're like, oh my word, I'm so sick of sewing, use your hot glue, get out your felt glue, glue it together. The only thing I would say is it probably is worth it to stitch these on so it's nice and sturdy because if you get a zillion cards, it could become a little heavy.
Um, download the pattern, have fun making it, and honestly, if you guys end up turning this into something that isn't just a simple gingerbread house you make the birthday cake or if you make it into a holiday house with the snaps and all these ideas, please tag me, tag raftsy because I would love to see how these. Get customized for your holiday celebrations and if you get started this July also I wanna see maybe we can all be inspired by each other finishing off our um holiday projects so happy Christmas in July happy making um this is awesome. I can't wait to see everybody's making and I hope that this inspired you to make your own cardholder or birthday card holder or holiday card holder or whatever all the ideas were flowing. And I hope it inspires you to get crafting and get excited about it's kind of the doldrums of summer where we're maybe overwhelmed and busy to sit down and do something for yourself. So thanks for joining me.
Happy Christmas in July and we will see you soon.
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