Valentine’s day is right around the corner (it’s next Tuesday y’all!) so, I’m dedicating this week to love! What says love more than a heart? This metal stitched heart is a great way to add a little love to your decor without going overboard. I like to add touches here and there for Valentine’s Day just to brighten up things a bit while winter is winding down. It also gives me a reason to redecorate my new mantle shelf! 😉
Materials Used
- old flashing – Regular flashing will work, it will just be shiny and new. The flashing I’m using is leftover from redoing a floor in my house, so it’s nice and grungy!
- metal cutters – I only have large ones and I did use them to cut the smaller hearts. It would definitely be easier to do with smaller snips!
- hammer and nail – The nail size depends on what size hole you want. I used a fairly large wood nail. You also want something that’s easy to hold while hammering.
- glue – I used Aileen’s tacky glue for the glitter and e6000 to attach the hearts.
- glitter – The link is to a whole pack of glitter, but I just noticed I’ve had this pack for almost 4 years! I bought it from Amazon and it shows when I last purchased it. None of the packs are even half empty and little really goes a long way!
- embroidery thread – If you don’t want to buy a whole pack, craft stores usually carry singles for about 25 cents each. Sometimes you can find them in Walmart.
- needle – The size really depends on what size holes you punch in the metal.
- sharpie – For drawing the design.
My photos will show the hearts already cut out. You can see more about cutting the metal in my metal feather post.
Marking & Punching the Design
Once the metal heart is cut out, turn it with the back side facing you. The back side will be what ever side you don’t want to show. I’d rather see the grungy side, so I’m drawing on the shiny side. In my metal feather post, I used soap stone to mark my design. I did that because I wasn’t reversing the design and it wipes off easily. Today I’m using a regular black sharpie. It’s easier to see and I don’t care if it wipes off because it won’t be seen.
Once you’ve decided on the design, it’s time to punch some holes! Place the heart on top of a flat surface, such as an old piece of wood or work bench. It needs to be something you don’t mind having nail holes in. Place the nail on top of the drawn line and give it a good hit with the hammer. This should be enough to punch a small hole in the metal with the tip of the nail.
Go around the whole design, leaving about 1/2″ between holes. I didn’t measure this, but you can if you want it to be exact.
Stitching the Design
Now that all the holes are punched, it’s time to stitch the design on the heart. Embroidery thread typically has 6 strands twisted together. I cut a length and divided this in half, so I was using 3 strands. This went through the hole easier and didn’t fray as frequently. Since you’re pulling thread through rough metal holes, it does tend to fray and break eventually.
I had to double knot the thread to keep the end from pulling through the holes. You could glue or tape this as well.
This took me longer to do than I expected! Originally I had glued glitter to this. I decided I didn’t like it and washed it off. This clogged up some of the holes making it more difficult to get the needle through. You may want to wear gloves while doing this!
There! Now my heart’s all stitched up!
Hmmm…..It still needs a little something.
Adding Small Glitter Hearts
I decided I still wanted some glitter, so I made smaller metal hearts to attach to the larger hearts. I just added glue and sprinkled with glitter! You can also see my metal feather post {again} for how to add glitter to metal.
Sparkly!
I really wanted to use my soldering iron to add these hearts. Turns out it’s harder to than I thought! Since that didn’t work, I turned to my “holds it all together” – e6000 glue!
I bent the hearts a little to make them stand out. This is going on my mantle shelf as part of my Valentine’s decor. Here’s a little sneak peak!
I’ll show you more later – pinky promise! Y’all have a marvelous Monday and keep smiling!
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