Have you ever wanted to try embroidery? This embroidered hearts bunting is a great way to try your hand at some easy embroidery work. Not to mention that it is super adorable as well!
Welcome back friends! Today I am going to be sharing this sweet little embroidered hearts bunting with you! This garland is perfect for Valentine’s Day decorating, but it is not just limited to that! You could also use it in a nursery or child’s room, it would even be cute in your own room! 🙂
First, I feel like I have to give a disclaimer here that I am not an expert in embroidery. I have made some previous embroidery projects like the beautiful napkins in my summer wildflower tablescape, although I never got around to making a tutorial for them. 🙁 However, I do have some tutorials for some simpler projects like these hand embroidered gift tags and cross stitch initial gift tags. So I do have a little experience to share, but my embroidery may not be perfect. This tutorial is just showing you how I did it.
This is not a quick project but it is one that is worth the time you invest in it! Plus, I happen to find embroidery work peaceful and soothing. There is something about it that makes it so satisfying to do. Especially when you see your end product and how beautiful it is.
Choose your own colors for your embroidered hearts
I love how these hearts are in an Ombre color pattern. These colors were chosen because they go with my Valentine’s decor this year. I will be sharing that with you soon! If you are not a fan of these colors, the nice thing is you can make these embroidered hearts in any color you want! The options are only limited to what colors of embroidery thread there are out there, and that is A LOT!! Ha!
The inspiration for this heart banner came from this cute Etsy shop, so if you don’t want to take the time to make one, you can purchase one from her! I don’t know how she has the time to make them all though. Honestly, she should be charging way more for the time involved in making one! Buckle up because this will be a longer post since there are six different hearts to make and I will be explaining each one separately.
Watch the quick video (Coming Soon)
Don’t want to read all the instructions? I have included a video in this post showing you how to make this embroidered hearts bunting. If you can’t see the video, turn off your ad blocker. Also, if you ever want to slow down the video, just click on the three dots in the lower right hand corner of the video and you can change the playback speed. If you want more detailed instructions, continue reading.
Supplies to make an embroidered hearts bunting
*There are links to products in this post that I use or are similar to products I use. If you buy something from one of these links, I may make a small commission (with no additional cost to you) from the purchase. I will not recommend anything that I would not buy myself.
- Drop cloth or muslin fabric
- Embroidery thread in colors of your choice. Here are the colors I used:
- Dark Burgundy – DMC 902
- Light Burgundy – DMC 221
- Red – DMC 498
- Salmon – DMC 3328
- Dark Blush – DMC 3778
- Light Blush – DMC 353
- Pink – DMC 761
- Large eye embroidery needle
- Embroidery hoop
- Scissors
- Twine
- Pennant shape and heart template – see below
Print out the pennant and heart template
To access the pennant and heart template, click on the link below:
I would recommend printing this out on cardstock if you have it because that will make a sturdier template. If not, regular paper will work too. The most important thing is to print this template at 100% to make sure the size is correct. Every printer is different so just make sure your settings are NOT set to ‘fit to page’ or that the box is not checked letting your printer make changes.
I included several different hearts in case you like one more than another. I used the heart in the lower right corner, the one that has a mini matching heart, for all of the different embroidered hearts. It looks different on the finished pennants because of how the embroidery affects the heart, but they were all made with that one.
Also, if you don’t want to sew across the top of the pennant, you can just cut out the shape of the two pennants on top of each other and just fold it over. I ended up cutting them out separately because I wanted to make all the edges of the bunting look the same. It’s up to you though, you could skip a step in sewing doing it the other way. Realistically, you don’t even have to sew this bunting if you don’t mind the back of the embroidered hearts showing on the back side of the garland. You could just glue the top edge over some twine and call it a day. I sewed the two panels together to cover the back sides of the hearts so it looked more finished that way.
Cut out the pennant and heart shape you want to use.
Trace the shapes onto fabric
I used a piece of drop cloth for my bunting since I had it leftover from another project. This kind of fabric works wonderfully with embroidery as it is thicker and is woven a bit more loosely. It was very easy to poke the needle through when working with it. I used a pencil to trace two pennant shapes onto the fabric. The pencil is nice because it eventually wears off but stays long enough for you to do your embroidery work.
Next, trace your heart in the center of the pennant furthest in from the edge. This will allow room for you to put the fabric into the embroidery hoop.
Now place the fabric in the embroidery hoop and tighten to make the fabric taut. You will repeat these steps before each heart you embroider.
How to embroider a fly stitch heart
The first heart we will tackle is the heart with the line running down the middle. Really all the embroidered hearts are easy but this is probably the most simple heart to make. I realized as I was making these hearts that I did not photograph the first two as I was making them. D’oh! So I ended up taking screenshots from my video. At least you get the idea from them still. 🙂 If you have any further questions about how to make these hearts, you can also watch the video to see how it is done.
This heart is essentially made from making consecutively bigger fly stitches. To make a fly stitch, you come up with your needle from the back of the fabric on the right side of the heart. Then go down on the left side directly across from where you came up. You will not pull the thread all the way down though. Leave an arch of thread.
Next, you want to make a vertical tacking stitch to hold the thread in the shape of a V. Bring your needle up from the back at the bottom of the V in the heart. Run the needle under the arch of thread and pull the arch down so it now looks like a V. Pull all your working thread taut but not too tight as it could bunch the fabric. Push your needle back down through the fabric directly under where you came out with the thread. Pull the thread down tacking down the V in place.
Continue these steps going out further on each side of the heart as you work your way around the heart. Your V will get bigger as you keep working and it will get to a point where it will fill in the end. After your last V, tie off the embroidery thread on the back.
How to embroider a woven heart
I used two different colors for the woven heart, a darker burgundy for the vertical stripes and a lighter burgundy for the horizontal stripes. However, in the pictures it looks pretty much like all the same color. You can use the same color if you want, I thought this would look cooler. Ha! I think I needed to use some more contrasting thread colors for that. To start, using vertical stitches, loosely fill in the heart. Make sure to keep space in between each line. To use less thread, I came up with the next line right next to where I went down with the previous stitch.
Once your vertical heart is done, start making some horizontal stitches. This is where you will have to weave the thread over and under the vertical stripes. Use your needle to rock back and forth under the vertical threads. Pull the horizontal stripe taut but not too tight. Use the needle to nestle the horizontal thread up close to the one above it.
When you reach the point where you will be going all the way across the heart with a horizontal stitch, make a knot on the center line thread. To do this, insert your needle down before the center line and come up on the other side. Now go down again in the same spot as before as pull the thread taut.
This step is not necessary, but it gives it a cool center line look similar to the last heart and can help to not bunch up your fabric from pulling it too tightly all the way across the heart.
How to embroider a French knot heart
This is definitely my favorite embroidery stitch! I love the way it looks when you have an area filled in with French knots. They are really easy to make as well. To make a French knot, come up from the back with the needle. Take your working thread and wrap it around the needle three times. While holding the working thread taut, go back down the same hole you came up through with your needle. Keep holding the loop as you pull all the thread through the French knot.
This essentially works like a tacking stitch around loops. It looks so cool, doesn’t it? Just continue to make French knots to fill in the whole heart.
Here is the front and back of the finished French knot heart.
How to embroider a satin stitch heart
I wasn’t quite sure what to call this heart but essentially we are making this heart outline using a satin stitch. For this heart, you will need to trace the mini heart centered inside the big heart.
Starting at the top in the center, place a stitch between the bottom of the two V’s of the hearts. Then, following the outline of the hearts, make another stitch right next to the first one and continue in this fashion to fill in the space between the two heart outlines. I ended up just wrapping the thread around on the backside too so it looks very similar in the back. As you work your way around the heart, you will have to occasionally enter the same hole twice on the smaller heart as it is a smaller area to work with. On the outside bigger heart, I was always able to make a new hole to poke the thread through.
Continue making your way around filling in the heart.
The finished heart…
How to embroider a twisted heart
I am not entirely sure if I did this one correctly. I just looked at a picture and made up my own version. Ha! However, I think it still looks great. 🙂 With this heart, I started by making a vertical stitch from the top to the bottom in the center of the heart. After coming back up to the right of the previous stitch, cross over to the opposite side of the heart and push the needle through next to the first stitch on the left side of it. Continue doing this as you make your way around the heart always crossing over in the center.
I left some space in between the stitches so you can see through them. You could also do the stitches right next to each other to make the heart more filled in. The end result looks like a twist in the middle of the heart. Cool, huh?
I thought I would share a picture of my little helper through this project. This is one of our cats, her name is Elsa, the other one is Anna of course. 😉 She LOVES thread and yarn so anytime I do a project with those, she is right next to me. She is staring down that thread and sometimes she gets ahold of it! LOL I couldn’t ask for a cuter helper though.
Cut out your pennants
When you are done embroidering each heart, you will have to cut out the two pennants that you traced for that heart. Just follow along the line when cutting them out. The pennants should fit together perfectly.
Cut some twine
To make these embroidered hearts into a garland, we need to sew the pennants onto some twine. I cut a piece of twine about 60 inches long. You may want yours longer or shorter depending on where you will use it. I am using mine on my mantel so 60″ works well. The twine will sit under the top seam of each pennant shape, however we want the pennant to move freely along the twine so you have to make sure not to sew the fabric to the twine.
How to sew an embroidered hearts bunting
The first step is to sew the top seam of the pennants. I used the overcast stitch function on my sewing machine. It acts like a serger to sew the open edges together. It essentially sews a zigzag and a straight stitch at the same time. Make sure you use the correct foot for your machine for this (mine was the C foot). Place the two panels of the pennant together and sew along the top edge. I noticed it worked better if I was not directly next to the edge when sewing it as that bunched up the fabric. I went back and re-stitched along the top of each pennant to make them look better after it was done.
Next, open the pennant and place the twine up next to the seam. Close the pennant and nestle the twine as close to the seam as possible. You could pin it in place, but I did not.
Starting right below the twine, stitch along the edge. Notice how my fabric is moved over a bit further to the right than the edge of the foot attachment. This made the edges look better like I was saying previously.
Make a turn at the end of the pennant and stitch up the other side until you get to the twine. Continue adding the other pennants onto the twine. Make sure you can still move them along the twine after sewing them. Finally, hang your embroidered hearts bunting to display it. I just use command hooks on the sides and front of the mantel to do this.
Here are some other heart garlands you may enjoy
Whew! We made it! I told you it was going to be a long post! Are you inspired to start hand embroidering? I hope this has given you the confidence to at least try it. It is a fun hobby. I still would like to embroider some pillowcases, I’ll get that done one of these days. 😉 I will be back soon to share my Valentine’s Day decor with you, although I may have another fun craft to share first. I will see how motivated I am in the next week. Ha! Have a wonderful week. Chat soon friends!
Hello! I am so glad you came to visit my site today. I hope you can take something from here to inspire you or just make you smile.
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