Create your own enchanted woodland bear mask with this printable PDF felt mask pattern!
My kids absolutely love to play pretend and dress-up! We’re nearing Halloween, but in this household costumes are a part of everyday life! What is more fitting than felt masks that can be worn anytime?
DIY Felt Mask Tutorial
The bones of this woodland bear mask are relatively easy to pull together. It’s an easy beginner’s sewing project and great introduction to hand stitching.
But what I love to do with my handmade felt masks is to add lots of little details! What transforms this mask from the ordinary to the extraordinary are the details. And I’ll show you how to do it all in this tutorial.
What you’ll need:
- printable PDF bear mask sewing pattern
- 2-3 brown felt sheets
- felt scraps for details
- needle and thread
- embroidery floss
- ribbon or elastic (for keeping the mask in place)
- NEW SVG file for personal die cutting machines (optional)
Let’s get started!
Begin by cutting out all of the pattern pieces as per the recommendation on my printable felt mask pattern.
I like to cut my felt patterns in any of the following ways:
1. Trim the pattern from the paper. Trace the pattern shapes onto the felt and trim on the traced lines.
2. Trim the pattern from the paper and pin to the felt sheets. Cut the felt by cutting around the pattern shapes.
3. Roughly trim the pattern pieces from the paper (not on the lines but just to make the paper smaller). Tape the paper to the felt with some wide packing tape, taking care to completely cover the paper with tape. Trim through the layers by cutting on the lines. This works best for small shapes and precision felt cutting.
Sew the “Nose” piece onto the end of the “Front Face/Snout” piece.
Match the “Front Face/Snout” piece to one of the “Mask Base” pieces at the top. Pin and stitch in place across the top then moving downwards toward the eye holes.
Pin the “Side Of Snout” pieces to the sides of the “Front Face/Snout” piece just where the corner of the eyes meet the snout.
Continue stitching downwards moving on to stitch the “Side of Snout” pieces in place.
When you reach the end of the nose fold the excess fabric inwards and pin in place. Stitch in place behind the nose but do not stitch the nose in place just yet.
Go back and repeat these steps to sew the opposite side of the snout in place.
Once both sides are stitched in place pin the “Side of Snout” pieces to the “Mask Base” piece. Stitch the sides in place.
Change to a different colored thread and stitch the nose down in place.
Now to add some detail!
Just a reminder – if you are impatient, or intimidated by all the small pieces and embroidery you can totally use the mask “as is” her and now.
OR
you could go with adding easy details like buttons or fabric paint!
Let start by adding the acorns and oak leaves. You may want to play around with placement and pin the pieces where you think they will look best before actually sewing in place.
Sew the bottom part of the acorn on first, and then the top slightly overlapping the bottom.
I used a quick stitch of embroidery floss to create the stem on top of the acorn.
I stitched the oak leaves in place with embroidery thread, beginning the stitches well above the leaves to create a stem there as well.
Next I created a a series of french knots just outside of the oak leaves.
I sewed in the little flowers on either side next to the french knots and topped them with embroidered leaves using the lazy daisy stitch (see link just above for video tutorial for these stitches.)
Next I added 3 very simple stitches of bright embroidery thread to make a series of dots in front of the flowers.
Lastly I added the small leaves at the outer edges with a simple running stitch and embroidery thread. I also added some very dots to represent whiskers using a very simple series of tiny embroidery thread stitches.
The very last step to finishing this felt mask tutorial is to baste stitch in some ribbon (or elastic) on the back of the “Mask Base” piece. Match the second “Mask Base” onto the back sandwiching the ribbon in between the two layers. Stitch the two “Mask Base” pieces together.
Hand over to your kids to enjoy!
A Few Last Minute Felt Mask Pattern Sewing Tips…
I like to use a small tight blanket stitch throughout this pattern and switch to a running stitch when necessary.
Remember – the mask is made in two layers! So that means you can hide unwanted stitching and knotted threads at the back of the mask, and then hide it at the end with the second layer!
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Thank you for this pattern and tutorial! I’ll try this for my boys!
I love your small little details and this is the first time I have seen someone talk about using tape to cut out thier small pattern pieces, I like doing that, but have never seen anyone mention it before.