Brooching the subject

 
Things you'll need: 

1. 3 or 4 feathers
2. A needle and thread
3. A lone or broken earring
4. A pin
5. Superglue

This DIY takes literally 5 minutes and costs pennies to make, but the results are very cute. You can pick up a bag of feathers at the dollar store. The bag I bought will allow for more brooches than I will ever be able (or willing) to make.

I used an earring I bought a while ago. The piece that goes through your ear snapped off the day I bought it. I've tried to fix it, but it's fairly hopeless. Fortunately I'm also a major pack-rat and couldn't let it go, which is when crafting comes in handy.  If you don't have broken or lone earrings to use I would recomment stopping by Value Village.  They sell interesting earrings for as little as 50 cents. 

Any sort of pin will do, nothing fancy necessary.


How to assemble:

1. Thread your needle, ensuring the knot at the end of the thread is quite large
2. Starting with the biggest feather, thread the shaft of the feather onto the needle as you would beads. Continue until you are happy with the shape.  I used 1 large feather, 2 medium sized feathers and 1 small feather to form a tear drop shape.
3. After all the feathers are strung wrap the thread around the base of the brooch a couple times, to secure all the feathers together.
4. Superglue the earring to the base of the feathers.
5. Tie a new piece of thread to the pin.  Sew the pin onto the brooch by making small stiches that wrap around the shafts of the feathers.
6. Done!  Attach it to a blazer to flash things up a bit!

Posted by: Jean