Before you throw out that old t-shirt why not practice your stitching skills and free hand sew your drawings?
Sewing projects can seem really boring when you have to follow instructions or make something specific.
All you need for this is:
Embroidery threads - you can buy packs of these from the pound shop
On an old plain t-shirt we want you to draw a picture in felt pen. Choose a light colour pen so that you can still see your lines but one that will be easily hidden by your stitches.
Step 2 – Threading the needle
This can be tricky so you may need adult supervision here. Choose the colour thread you want to start with, cut apiece as long as your arm.
We want to keep your embroidery thread thick but there are too many threads at the moment and so you need to split 4 threads off it. Once you’ve done this twist the end together to help thread them through your needle.
Sewing with thicker cotton by using multiple threads makes pulling the thread through easier and gives you thicker lines to hide your drawing.
Don’t forget to knot the end of your thread once it’s through the needle. If you knot the two ends together it means your needle won’t fall off mid stitching.
Remember to start from the underside of the fabric so that your knot is hidden.
We are just going to use a running stitch, which looks like a dashed line.
Bring your needle up through the fabric from the underside until the knot hits the fabric. Next bring the needle back through the topside of the fabric a bit further down from where your stitch came through. Remember to stitch over the lines of your drawing. Then bring the thread back up from the underside and start all over again! (You can either do the standard up and down, or push the needle through and make several stitches at once.)
Don’t forget that when you get close to the end of the thread that you need to knot it. Make sure to knot it on the underside so that no-one can see your knots.
You can use different colours for different elements of your drawing.
Once you’ve stitched over your drawing you will have a new, unique t-shirt. Or if your t-shirt is really old you could cut around your stitched design to make a patch to sew onto another item of clothing, a pillowcase or to frame.
We did some free stitching in the gallery with 3- 8 year olds so anyone can do it!
