I’m totally in love with Prim folk art, it’s so sincere and always comes straight from the heart. To celebrate valentines day I made these primitive bed spring hearts to give to all the special people in my life.

A suitcase full of hearts ready for Valentines day

They’re really easy to make and you can add your own message to show how much you care.

What you need to make primitive hearts

• Scraps of material in  earthy colours (I used scraps of quilting fabric)
• Bits of lace, burlap and ribbon
• Some buttons, bells, old keys or anything else that will add some character
• Safety pins
• Coffee bags
• Printer and paper
• Pinking shears and stuffing

What you need to make primitive hearts

Before I could make the hearts I needed to stain the lace and ribbons. I couldn’t find any that looked rustic and worn, which is what prim folk art is all  about. So I had to try change what we had in our stash. To stain the ribbons and lace, I added two coffee bags to some boiling water and let them soak for a few minutes and then hung them up to dry. The longer they soak the more rustic they’ll look. You can do the same with your material scraps if they look too new 🙂 Oh, and don’t throw the coffee bags away, we’ll be using them a bit later.

Use coffee to stain your material if it doesn’t look old enough

While you’re waiting for your stuff to dry print some labels. You can make your own or you can download some here. Cut the labels out and use the wet coffee bags to stain them too.

To make the hearts, use the pinking shears to cut out 2 heart shapes from your material measuring 15 to 25 cm high. I found anything smaller was a bit difficult to sew neatly. Take one of the hearts and start playing around with the lace, burlap, ribbons, buttons and keys. Layer them on top of each other or next to each other until you’re happy with the look.

Just playing around

Sew on all the bits and bobs to the one heart and then sew the two hearts together, RIGHT SIDE facing out, leaving a small opening towards the bottom of the heart. Stuff your heart firmly and sew closed. Add the label using a safety pin and pop them into a bed spring.

Making the Bed Springs

If you can’t find a bed spring (like me), they’re really easy to make.  You need some galvanised steel binding wire, a bottle and some side cutters.

A bottle and some wire

Wrap the wire around the bottle starting at the top and slowly wind your way down to the bottom. Cut with the side cutter.

Making the bed springs

You could also take pallet off cuts and hammer in a rusty nail from your stock pile of salvaged nails and hang your heart.

Use pallet off cuts, chalk paint and rusty nails to hang your hearts

Primitive hearts in a bed spring

Wishing everyone a beautiful valentine’s day filled with love and laughter and gifts made from the heart.