my crafty valentine: a fabric valentine tutorial

Since this is Anabelle's first Valentines Day, I thought it would be nice to make her a valentine that she could keep - or, I guess, we could keep for her. I got inspired by these images of fabric valentines-y things in the French magazine Marie Clair Idées:

from Marie Clair Idées

... So I decided to try to make some quilted Valentines cards. I checked my fabric scrap stash, and found some nice pink prints for Anabelle's, and some that were a little more masculine to make one for Dave (okay, maybe they're not masculine, exactly, but it was as close as I could get), as well as some scrap quilt batting.

I cut a cover and an inside layer to 6x8", and cut the batting to the same size. Then I decorated the front cover (right side of cover fabric) and the inside page (right side of the inside fabric) with scrap hearts, pinked squares and stamped lettering, allowing for a 1/4" seam allowance around the outer edge.

To make it easy, I used iron-on fusible web, so I didn't have to stitch everything down, and pinked the applique edges so I didn't have to finish them.

When I finished decorating, I ironed everything down, added some embroidery stitching and sewed the layers together using the pillowcase method. 

To do this I lay the layer of batting on my work table, then I lay the inside layer face up on the batting, and the cover layer face down on top of that. Then I pinned the layers securely and stitched all three together with a 1/4" seam allowance, leaving a 2-3" gap for turning on the lower back edge. Once stitched, I trimmed the excess seam allowance, turned the cards right-side-out, hand-stitched the gap closed, and ironed the cards flat. Then I top-stitched a seam at the center where the fold should be.

For Anabelle's card, I added some silk ribbons as a closure before I stitched the layers together. For Dave's, I sewed a doubled ribbon to the back and a button to the front after I finished sewing the card.