Tap into Christmas nostalgia and use fabric and felt to create a collection of Christmas postcards

What you need...

• Fabric: Christmas Wish, Dashwood Studio; patterned, dark green, light green, cream; plain, red
  
• Felt, green: dark, light
  
• Wadding
  
• Interfacing, iron-on: pelmet; standard
  
• Embellishments: ricrac, spotty, red; ribbons, Christmas, assorted; buttons, white, small, medium; red, small, large; bell, silver; flower, beaded, silver
  
• Bias binding, red, spotty
  
• Stamps, acrylic, alphabet
  
• Ink-pad, black
  
• Shears, pinking
  
• Glue stick

instructions

1. Silver Bell - 1 Cut cream fabric, 14cm x 19cm, and back with interfacing. Cut patterned red fabric, two 2cm x 19cm strips and two 2cm x 14cm lengths, and pin all sides of the cream, right sides facing. Stitch, leaving a 5mm seam allowance along the outside edge. Fold the strips back and press. Sew all the way around using red thread, 2mm from the fold. Stamp a 'Post Card’ sentiment using black ink. Embroider a greeting and address in navy, then press.
   
   2 Trim spotty poinsettia fabric, 2.5cm x 3cm, glue to the top-right corner, then sew green scallops and black waves onto it and press. Cut wadding, 14cm x 19cm, then cut patterned green fabric, 18cm x 23cm, and lay it wrong side up. Place the wadding in the middle and lay the postcard front side up, then pin together. Stitch a line down the middle and through the layers, then press.
   
   3 Starting at the bottom, fold the backing fabric over the front, then fold over again to create the binding. Pin into place, mitre the corners and stitch. Set aside. Cut a 6cm circle from red snowman fabric using pinking shears. Make four 5cm circles from patterned cream fabrics. Fold each cream circle in half and half again to create triangles. Sew each point to the centre of the red to make a circle. Cut a small light green felt circle and glue to the middle.
   
   4 Stitch ribbon, 36cm, to the top-left corner and secure the decorated circle over the top before adding a silver bell to the middle. Fold the other ribbon end under and secure to the right with a red button. Cut two holly leaves in shades of green and sew to the bottom-right corner with a red button for a berry.

2. Mistletoe Wishes - 1 Back cream fabric, 12cm x 16cm, with iron-on interfacing. Stamp a 'Post Card' sentiment to the top-middle. Cut a red snowman motif into a small rectangle, glue it to the top-right, then add decorative stitches. Make a greeting in blue, then press. Cut wadding and red fabric to the same size as the front. Place the wadding between the red and the postcard, right side up, then pin together. Sew a line down the middle and under the 'Post Card' wording.
   
   2 Stitch around and through the layers. Slot a length of spotty red bias binding, 65cm, onto the post card and cover all the raw edges, then pin and secure. Cut a ‘Christmas Wish’ sentiment from fabric and sew to the bottom-right corner. Trim two mistletoe branches from green felt, then fix them to the top-left. Stitch green striped ribbon, 30cm, to the top corners. Add buttons over the right ribbon piece, mistletoe and phrase, then sew a decorative silver trim to the left.

3. Starry Night - 1 Cut pelmet interfacing, 11cm x 15.5cm, then trim floral fabric, 12.5cm x 17cm. Use a glue stick to hold the interfacing to the middle of the fabric, wrong side up. Fold each side over onto the front, mitre the corners, then stitch.
   
   2 Place cream fabric, 9cm x 14cm, to the middle of the section, then sew close to the edges and press. Secure spotty red ricrac, 50cm, over the raw edges.
   
   3 Write a greeting on the front. Stitch three yellow curved lines and sew a star button where they meet. Fold metallic blue ribbon, 25cm, into three small loops, then secure it to the top-left. Add a large red and star button over the ends.