Archive for March, 2010

When after the Winter alarmin’,
The Spring steps in so charmin’,
So fresh and arch
In the middle of March,
Wid her hand St. Patrick’s arm on…
~Alfred Percival Graves

Go mbeannai Dia duit

Here’s to my favorite lad with the shamrock on his chest.

Yesterday was my first sewing lesson for our after school clubs at our local elementary school.  Since my class is mostly 1st and 2nd grade students, my thought was to keep it simple.  I decided to teach one type stitch and sew a project to accompany it each week.

I made these little sewing cards to help teach the stitch and let the kids practice, then we made the project.

For the first class we started with the most basic stitch- the running stitch.  I described to the girls that it called a running stitch because it’s fast, just like when you run.

As you can see from the card, we also practiced a simple two holed button.

The cards were made by printing out a picture and gluing it to the poster board.  I used my small hole punch to make the holes.

For both the cards and the project we used a #22 tapestry needle, which has a large eye and a more blunt tip, but it still capable of going through felt and fabric.

After a bit of practice, the girls made a little shamrock pin to wear on St. Patrick’s day.

I used inexpensive felt and buttons.  I cut out all the shamrocks and used a small dab of glue to adhere the two shamrocks together to make it easier for the girls to stitch.  As you can see they used the running stitch and sewed on a button.  You can also see that this little girl got a little impatient toward the end and her stitch got bigger.  I thought it was still such a nice job.

All of the girls did a beautiful job in fact.  When they were done, we hot glued on a brooch pin to the back.  I hope they wear them with pride tomorrow.