Dish Cloth Pumpkins

hymnsandhome — Wed, 29 Sep 2021 18:00:08 +0000

How to Turn a Simple Cotton Dish Cloth into a Sweet Fall Pumpkin in 5 Minutes with No Sewing

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Sometimes inspiration comes to me in the most random places. My little girl and I were in the kitchen section of Target the other day looking for dish towels my mom wanted. My daughter picked up a pack of white dish cloths that were on the shelf in front of her (I was being brave and letting her walk instead of ride in the cart – she’s 2 1/2). At first I said, “Oh, we don’t need those.” but then quickly discovered I liked how they felt. My mind immediately jumped from “I could use these in the kitchen” to “I bet I could make pumpkins out of these.” Don’t know why – that’s just how my brain works I guess!

The dish clothes I used were a pack of 6 white 100% cotton cloths for about $4. I already had the other supplies in my stash, so it cost me less than a dollar per pumpkin to make! Pretty budget friendly!

I absolutely adore the look of these pumpkins – the soft, subtly fuzzy texture, the clean white combined with a natural twine and earthy brown cinnamon stick. I feel like they would fit right in with just about any decor.

One of the best parts, in my opinion, is that there is no sewing involved. If you’ve been around here a while you may know I’m not the biggest fan of sewing. I know how to and I”ll do it when necessary, but if I can get away with not sewing, even better! Also a plus – they only take about 5 minutes apiece to make! That’s a huge win in my book as a mom of two (soon three) little ones!

They are not difficult to make, but I’ve indicated some specific folds and have tried to provide clear photos and directions on how to perform those folds. You can certainly reference my Youtube video if that is helpful to you. If you have any questions please feel free to leave a comment below and I’ll try to help!

Let’s get started on some easy dish cloth pumpkins!

Supplies

Tutorial

1. Lay out the dish cloth “wrong side” up (the side with the seam) and cut off any tags.

2. Place a large ball of stuffing in the center of the dish cloth.

3. Choose one corner and fold it over slightly; secure with a bead of hot glue.

4. Take the “pointed” corner (opposite the folded corner) and fold it up and over the ball of stuffing.

5. Pull the opposite corner (the folded one) taughtly over the pointed corner and secure with a line of hot glue.

6. Take another pointed corner and fold the long sides of it inward, as pictured below, to make it narrower and hold the stuffing in.

7. Fold it up to the top middle of the ball.

8. Fold the sides of the opposite pointed corner the same way to make it narrower and hold the stuffing in.

9. Fold the tip of it over and secure with hot glue.

10. Fold that section up to the center of the ball and secure with hot glue.

11. Cut a long length of twine (enough to wrap around this ball 4 times, plus about 6 inches extra). Place it under the ball and bring the ends up to the middle, leaving one end about 6 inches long and the other end very long.

12. Tie in a double knot. (You should have two lengths of twine coming from this knot – one just a few inches and the other very long.)

13. Wrap the twine around the ball again, this time perpendicular to the first wrap. Bring it up to your starting point and slip the long length of twine under the knot.

14. Secure with a knot, using both the long and the short lengths of twine to tie it.

From the opposite side, it will now look like this:

15. Do the same as before, wrapping the twine around the ball, but this time catty-corner (on the diagonal). Slip under the knot and secure by tying.

Looks like this from the opposite side:

16. Now do the same to the opposite corner.

17. It should look like this. Cut off the excess twine once knotted.

It will look like this from the opposite side:

18. With the pumpkin turned “right side up” (knots on the bottom), find the center (in the middle of all the criss-crossed strings). Snip a very small slit in the fabric, being sure not to cut the twine.

19. Place the cinnamon stick into the slit, allowing the strings of twine to go around it on all sides. To secure, add hot glue to the bottom of the stick before inserting.

20. Take a length of twine and wrap it around the base of the cinnamon stick multiple times – however thick you’d like – leaving enough length on both ends to tie a bow.

21. Finish with a bow and trim ends to desired length.

All done!

While that probably seemed like a pretty lengthy tutorial, it’s only because I tried to really break it down step by step so there was [hopefully] no confusion. It actually goes really quickly once you know how to do it!

These pumpkins would look adorable all lined up on a shelf or hutch, tucked into a bowl as filler, on a table as part of a Fall tablescape…so many possibilities for them!

I hope you enjoyed this quick, easy, and inexpensive Fall DIY tutorial and that you’ve been inspired to whip up some dish cloth pumpkins of your own!

Blessings,
Melissa

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