Smiling’s My Favorite – Embroidery Hoop Art

So I’m kind of addicted to making Hoop Art. This you might already know.

Well since it’s Christmas time I felt like I needed to change out some of my hoops with Christmas versions! So my first one is this Smiling’s My Favorite Embroidery hoop art – inspired by one of our favorite Christmas movies – Elf!

I had a hard time deciding on a quote to stitch. I mean, there are so many great ones in Elf.

•  I’m a cotton-headed ninny-muggins.
• Buddy the Elf! What’s your favorite color?
• The best way to spread Christmas Cheer, is singing loud for all to hear.
• We elves try to stick to the four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns and syrup.

It was tough. But in the end I had to go with I just like to Smile, smiling’s my favorite. It makes me  . . . smile. :)

I added in a little Buddy the Elf applique too!

This is super easy to make too. Just a little embroidery and fusible web and you have a super cute Christmas hoop!!

Here’s your materials list:

• 10″ hoop
• Fabric for background
• Fabric for Buddy’s coat, tights and shoes (just scraps – I used cotton for the tights and shoes and the coat is fleece)
• Fusible Webbing
• Embroidery thread for writing and details on the coat. I used black, dark green and gold
• Hot Glue and Felt for finishing back of hoop
• pattern (this is a little different from mine, I hand drew the lettering but I’ve included it in the pattern if you don’t want to do that)

Begin by tracing your letting onto your fabric and embroidering it. I used a simple backstitch for the whole thing, you can find instructions here for Embroidery Stitches.

Cut out your coat, tights and shoes pieces. Iron fusible webbing to the back side of the tights and shoes. Lay the coat piece onto the fabric where you would like it. (use the hoop as a guide for placement)

Fuse the tights on top of the coat, making sure when you fold the coat over it looks the way you want. Fuse your shoe pieces over the ends of the tights so you can’t see the bottom of the fabric. (If you are using fleece, be careful when ironing. You may want to put down a piece of fabric between the iron and the fleece.

Thread a needle with three strands of dark green embroidery thread. Fold the coat so the loose end pieces meet in the middle. Sew the ends and bottom of the coat down with little diagonal stitches.

Using some sparkly gold embroidery thread, add some details down the front of the coat along each curved side. I did a pattern of lazy daisy stitches and cross stitches. It doesn’t matter a bunch what you do if you are working on fleece because you can’t really see the detailing. It just looks like some gold stitching, which is what we’re going for anyway.

That finishes off the front of the hoop! Add the fabric to the hoop so the top of the coat is outside the top of the hoop. Trim the fabric all the way around.

Hot glue the fabric to the inside of the embroidery hoop.

Cut a piece of felt a little smaller than your hoop. Hot glue the felt to the back of the hoop, stretching the felt just a little so it fits the hoop and is nice and tight.

And that’s it! So cute right?

I love how it turned out. Now I need to get working on some other Christmas hoops!

Linking up at Met Monday, Tutorials & Tips Tuesday, Shabby Creek Cottage, 504 Main, The 36th Avenue Party, Block Party, and the other fabulous parties on the party page. Make sure you check them out!