Just keepin it in the family

As many of you know, Ruffles and Stuff has been hosting quite the exciting contest this month. I've been racking my brains for something ruffly and haven't been able to come up with anything. I think it's fair to say I've been afflicted with non-creativitis lately and it shows.

Sorry guys.

With the deadline being tomorrow, I had almost decided not to participate. Lately, I've been thinking a lot about family. Our families are such a blessing and have such importance in our lives. So, I decided I would make a family tree. I was a little intimidated with the feat of trying to make a tree out of ruffles. But, I think the texture of the ruffles is what makes it looks so whimsical.

Wanna make one? I cut a bunch of elongated triangular shapes out of the brown flannel and ruffled them up. I laid out the branches and trunk onto a sky blue print and sewed them in place. If I were to do this again, I think I would have ruffled the sky blue backdrop.

I ruffled up a ton of flowers out of two different green cotton twills. Initially, the flowers were all the same sizes, but I love the variety of sizes much better. Even throwing on a few yo-yo flowers would be darling!

Most of the flowers are embellished with vintage buttons or pearls so you can hang miniature "name tags" from them. I just cut a few small rectangles from cream card stock, hand-wrote a few family names onto them, poked a piece of thread directly through the "tag", tied a knot, and looped it around a button.

What fun it will be to continue adding to it over the years! I realize the construction details of this piece are vague, so if you'd like to make one, feel free to email me questions and I'd be happy to help you as much as I can.

Happy Easter everyone and happy weekend!