the gift making begins

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The dance company that Phoebe is involved in has a big sister/little sister program. They pair the junior company members with with senior company members so that each girl has someone specific to go to when she has questions or needs help. It also helps the older girls to reach out to the younger ones and really builds a sense of unity among them. The name fits nicely.

Phoebe’s big sister is a friend of ours and from the start has gone out of her way to help Phoebe feel included…even before she was Phoebe’s official big sister. I will forever be grateful for this very sweet young lady.

For a Christmas gift Phoebe made her this great silhouette using the same method that we’ve always used. But this time she added elements of the girl’s costume and decided to cover the frame with fabric to make it really fun.

Her big sister actually has two little sisters so Phoebe made one for the other sister, too.

I love the way they turned out. Phoebe did all of the silhouette by herself and I helped with the frame.

Here’s how we made the frame…

Supplies:
fun fur fabric – we purchased 1/3 of yard and can probably do 5-6 picture frames with it
frame – we used frames that fit a 4X6 photo (make sure to get one that when it is covered you can still get the back on)
black scrap booking paper for silhouette (other colors for embellishing)
white paper for background (you can run it through your printer to print names on it)
glue (for the paper)
spray craft glue (for the fabric)

Lay the frame right side down and measure the fabric over it. Make sure that the edge of the fabric just touches the inside, you don’t want a lot of bulk. 

Cut the fabric to fit. I used an acrylic ruler and an xacto knife.

Cut corners out of the sides. As we did this we flipped them up to see if we needed to angle them a little so there wouldn’t be much overlap. Cut an X down the middle…don’t go quite to the corner.

Cut the inside. I used the lip of the frame as my guide.

This is what it should look like. 

Spray each corner with a little glue and add a tuft of scrap fur to each corner. This is to make sure that the corners won’t poke out. Lay the frame face side down on the fabric and spray the inside with some glue. Carefully lay the fabric into the glue and pat down.Now, spray some glue around the rest of the frame and the fabric. Lay the fabric onto the glue and pat down. The fabric should do all the way into the crease where the photo will be.

Turn over and fluff the fur.

This post is shared at Made By You Mondays, Barn Hop #91, Show and Share, What I Learned Wednesday, Fun in the Functional,

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Angi Schneider

Angi Schneider is the author of The Ultimate Guide to Preserving Vegetables and Pressure Canning for Beginners and Beyond, both published by Page Street Publishing. She has taught canning classes for 177 Milk Street, been featured in Serious Eats, and written for Countryside Magazine. Angi has been sharing gardening, preserving, and simple living skills since 2010.