Methods of attaching appliques to crocheted items

[donnalynn2]

Ok, so I'm wondering what the best way would be????

 

I'm making my DH an american flag afghan for Christmas and will just barely get it done in time and instead of crocheting each individual star and sewing them in place I was thinking of getting 50 star appliques and attaching them but am wondering if this is possible? Could they be glued? Sewn? Would I need to find something like a "patch" or could I cut out felt? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

In the end, if you think that individually crocheting and sewing 50 little stars would take just as much time as any other method you can come up with, let me know that too! THANKS a bunch!

[Becky Morgan]

If they're really small, or even up to an inch and a half or so, I'd just embroider them. There's a good quick star pattern in an old Hooked On Crochet, or you could just do five chain loops and stretch them into shape with their anchoring stitches. It would probably be faster than anything else.

[cjansen]

I agree with be Becky embroidering them would be fastest and if you did it right 2 sided!

[donnalynn2]

Thanks for the suggestions! I like the idea of embroidering stars on the blanket but am not sure about how to do it. I want the stars to be "filled in" of course so am not sure how that would work. I was just re-watching the Knit & Crochet Today Episode where they showed how you can embroider on crocheted items but they only showed basic stitches like chain stitches and such. How would that look? My stars wouldn't be filled in so they would only be the lines of stars... I definately think that embroidering the stars would be the fastest way to go but need to know what stitch to use.

 

BTW, it looks like I will have the basic afghan finished up tonite and will be able to start on the stars of it later tonite or tomorrow which means I'll have only tomorrow to finish this thing. UGH! Talk about trying to rush to get this finished! Oh well, if I have to wrap a WIP for my hubby and finish it, I will, esp since I think he's on to me it's not a huge deal... LOL

[darski]

What about just doing 13 stars for Christmas?

 

- attach them gently in a circle and then make the rest and add them after Christmas.

[Becky Morgan]

One way to do it, by no means the only:

Figure out where the star needs to go. Pick your five points and pull the yarn through them to make the star outline, then fill in. You could satin stitch or you could just go slightly inside the original star and repeat the design as many times as needed. If you use bulky or doubled yarn, though, I don't think it'll take much.

 

If you need to see this in front of you, grab a piece of scrap paper and draw a star. Now pick a point on the star and draw the same lines just inside the others. Keep going, sort of the way we used to write our boyfriends' names and draw around and around them on our notebooks in boring high school classes:)

 

Or you can do the whole thing inside out: put five straight stitches in a star stitch, then "star" around them.

Either way, it'll work.