Thanksgiving turkey fun!

 Happy Thanksgiving to all my fellow Americans! And happy Thursday to everyone else, wherever you are! I’m grateful, this year, for my family, my friends, my yarn, Star Trek, and my rpg stuff. And other stuff, but that’s irrelevant now. Anyways, I’ve been very busy lately, but I did find time to try a project. 

I used to make handprint turkeys, while I was growing up. And now, I figured out something else. An embroidered handprint turkey! 

It’s a fairly simple project, perfect for kids as well as adults. You will need construction paper (or some other kind of thicker paper; I don’t recommend regular printer paper, because it won’t hold up to embroidery), embroidery floss (or any other kind of thicker thread for decorative work, like perle cotton, craft cord, or multiple strands of colorful sewing thread held together), a tapestry needle or other wide-eyed needle with a dull point, scissors, and a pencil. You may also want a sewing pin to punch holes, cardstock and glue to display it on, or more things to decorate with, like markers; you could use felt instead of construction paper if you want something that is all fabric. 

First, take a sheet of construction paper and trace your hand on it. If you want to get two hands out of one piece of paper, you want to go as close as you can to the edge of the paper so you can get more handprints out of one sheet.  Cut the handprint out. 

Next, draw lines to guide the embroidery. I just did straight lines to give me a guideline; vertically on the fingers/feathers, horizontally on the palm/body. On the thumb, either draw simple guidelines for eyes, a beak, and a wattle (the thing under the beak, if you’re a realist like me) so you can embroider them, or use a felt tip marker to draw them. Do the same on the legs and feet. 

Then, you can embroider! I used a pin to punch holes in the paper along the lines, mostly because my needle has a blunt enough tip that I was worried I would rip the paper. You don’t have to. Even simple stitches are really pretty on this; I liked using backstitch, fly stitch, and some simple couching on one of them, and a more complex design adapted from chicken scratch embroidery (aka depression lace) on the other. There are plenty of free tutorials for simple embroidery stitches online, which I found very helpful. 

I wouldn’t use knots, however, to start and end the threads, since that will make them bulge. I would weave the ends under the backs of the stitches, or alternatively glue/tape them down, so it stays flat.

Simple turkey, close up

The back of the handprints. 

Complicated turkey stuff

You can decorate these other ways too, such as with ribbon bows or drawing. 

After I made the handprints, I glued them onto a piece of white card stock. They make a lovely wall hanging! 

Edit, later the same evening: I should mention that I live in a place where turkeys basically own the streets and are just an annoying fact of life in certain areas. So have turkey pictures, because I found these going through and looking for yarn pictures.