fabric mail: put a stamp on it

A few years ago when I sent out birth announcements proclaiming to my 70 closest friends and family members that our second addition had arrived safely into the world, I forgot one very important thing on each super cute announcement . . . stamps.  Yeah, did you know that the post office kind of requires those?    

Have you ever done that?  To be honest, I'm surprised I've only done it once . . . well, 70 times I guess, but I only count it as once.  :)

As you may (or may not) know, I've been working hard on the mail - letters, envelopes, postcards (no-sew & sewing required) - for my eighth craft till Christmas, the pretend and play mail carrier kit.  I finished two fabric mailboxes and an assortment of mail. 

I have also begun work on two mail carrier bags - which I will have a tutorial on soon.  But I could not make any more progress on my two bags until this final detail was taken care of for the mail . . . stamps.

These are easy and hardly require a tutorial, but well, I'm a little obsessed with tutorials so here is a mini tute. 

Grab stuff:

-scraps that match or contrast with envelopes and postcards

-double-sided fusible interfacing
-Velcro - heat fusing or regular . . . either way, we're going to sew it on
-pinking shears (Did you know these are not all pink?  Did you know that there is a difference between shears and scissor?  Of course you did.  I didn't.  And yes, I am THAT new to sewing.)

1)  Take two scraps.  Sandwich the fusible interfacing in between scraps and fuse using package directions.  (As you can see, I didn't even take the time to square up scraps with interfacing.  Yes, I am THAT lazy!) 

2)  Use pinking shears to cut out little squares or rectangles about the same size as a postage stamp.  Don't do this until fabric is completely cool!  I learned this the hard way.

3)  Cut Velcro into little squares or rectangles that are smaller than the stamps and fuse one side of the pair onto each stamp.  Keep the other side for envelopes and postcards.

4)  After Velcro/stamp has completely cooled, sew around Velcro to secure in place.  This makes the stamp part super secure.  As I was playing around with the Velcro on the envelopes and stamps, I found that the Velcro seemed to pull away from the stamp as I took it on and off.  It didn't pull away from the envelope though, so I only added the extra security of sewing the Velcro on the stamp.  (Wow!  That was a super-long explanation for something you could have figured out on your own.)  I sewed them all in a row and then cut them apart.  A nice tip from a sewing friend that saves time and thread.

5)  Fuse other side of Velcro pair to envelopes and postcards.  After these cooled, I also went around the edges with super amazing fabric glue to give it a little more security.  I let it dry.  It dried clear and upheld against me slapping on and ripping off the stamps over and over again. 

6) Done and done!

Now I can move on to the mail carrier bags, but not right now . . . long weekend begins now.  Woo hoo!  I'll be back here on Sunday.  Have a great weekend and . . . 

craft on!