Felt Pumpkin Pincushion

This project was created to make something cute and useable from a plastic bottle cap (since caps are the part of the bottles, which are not recycled). A very orange- colored bottle cap was the inspiration to make a pumpkin pincushion. It is an ideal fall project. The low cost of the supplies would make this pincushion a good bazaar item or table/party favor decoration. You could even pin each guest’s name to a pincushion to make it a place card at your Thanksgiving dinner.

Supplies

1) One 1-3/4” wide orange (Gatorade) bottle cap

2) 3-1/2” diameter orange felt circle

3) Polyester fiberfill

4) Heavy duty thread (any color)

5) Wool roving (two shades of brown and two shades of green)

6) Brown embroidery floss

7) Fabri-Tac (Beacon)

8) Fancy head pins (Heidi Grace)

Tools

1) Doll makers needle

2) Felting needle pen

3) Felting block brush

4) Scissors

Procedure

1) With the heavy-duty thread, sew a running stitch along the edge of the felt circle.

2) Pull the thread to gather the circle into a ball shape.

3) Firmly stuff the hollow of the ball with fiberfill.

4) Use the heavy-duty thread and stitch across the opening to partially close it.

5) With the brown floss, split stitch six lines radiating from the center to the bottom of the pumpkin.

6) Roll some brown wool roving into a stem shape.

7) Using the needle pen on the felting block, pierce the stem until it is compact.

8) Place some green roving on the block and keep piercing it and adding more roving until it is a flat piece about 1-1/4”x1-1/2” wide.

9) Use the scissors to cut out a leaf shape from the flat green felted piece.

10) With the needle tool attach the stem and leaf to the top of the pumpkin.

11) Glue the pumpkin into the bottle cap.

12) Add as many head pins as you desire.

Tips

1) You can make other colored caps into pincushions, perhaps a black spider, red or .

green apple, etc.

2) Making pincushions would be an inexpensive.4-H or Girl Scout sewing project.

3) If you cannot find orange felt that matches the color of the bottle cap, you can color the felt with Martha Stewart tangerine rubber stamp ink.