Bringing Autumn to Us

I can't wait to move back to the states and have our own house.
I am so ready to be able to decorate for the seasons.
I have always wanted to do this, but having Emma makes me want to even more.
Sure I could decorate our apartment, but that would involve ordering basically
everything on-line and I hate ordering craft type stuff without being able to see it in person.
Pictures can be deceiving.  Plus, everything I create has to make the long
journey back to the states and I have heard plenty of horror stories about TMO
and people's things getting ruined.  I would be so mad if something I,
or more importantly Emma made got destroyed when we move back in a little less than a year.
So, because of these two reasons I have accepted the fact that
I just have to wait to bust out the pumpkin, turkey, and snowflake crafts.
But when I came across this adorable idea on Johnny in a Dress, I knew I couldn't wait.
I couldn't even wait til Christmas like the original craft is for.  I wanted to do this immediately.
All I would need to order is felt and I figured I could handle that.
Felt is an awesome material because it sticks to itself.
There is so much you can do with it, especially things to get little ones involved.
I thought this would be such a cute thing for Emma to play with during this time of year.
Plus, it can easily be adapted and added to in the coming years when she is older
and comes up with her own ideas.  I'm sure she will make some beautiful creations.
Unfortunately, I couldn't find orange felt so I had to to skip the pumpkin
and head straight for the Autumn tree with its colorful leaves.
Here's how it turned out...

Supplies:
felt in various Fall colors
wrapping paper
scissors
fabric glue
leaf pattern
velcro

I didn't want to draw the tree directly onto the felt in case I messed up

so first I drew it on wrapping paper and cut it out.  I just free handed the outline of the tree.

Then I traced the tree onto the dark brown felt and cut it out.

Next came the leaves, which ended up being kind of difficult for me.

First I tried to free hand them, but quickly found out that leaves are not my specialty.

Eventually I gave in to the power of Google

 and just traced basic leaf patterns onto regular paper and cut them out.  

I know trees technically only have one kind of leaf on them, 

but I thought Emma would like having the two different shapes.

Then I just traed my leaf patterns onto the different colored felt and cut them out.

I used red, yellow, and light brown felt for the leaves.

To finish the leaves off I simply cut out long, skinny rectangles from leftover dark brown scraps.
I glued one rectangle on the back of each leaf as a stem.

Finally, simply hang it on the wall.  I put a small piece of velcro on the end of each branch

and then stuck the other part of the velcro to the wall.  

I also put a few pieces of velcro on the trunk of the tree.

Randomly place the leaves where ever you want, and ta-da, 

you have an Autumn tree right in your living room.

In typical Emma fashion she basically wanted nothing to do with the tree

when I was trying to get pictures of her playing with it.

She loved playing with the leaves while I was in the process of cutting them all out

and she kept trying to rip the tree down while I was hanging it on the wall,

but at soon as I got the camera out she was done.