Easy faux leather tags for crochet and knit items!
I've been looking at getting leather tags for my hats forever! There are SOOOO many options on Etsy and online groups are always offering great recommendations. I've just been having such a hard time deciding on a design. It's hard to pull the trigger without really knowing how it'll come out. This morning I said I'm just going to finally pick one and try it. The people who make these are pros and I can't imagine it wouldn't look good, no matter what I decide.
Shortly thereafter, I fell down a Google rabbit hole and got the great idea to try and DIY some tags for fun. I've actually done labels before using an iron-on transfer. Sometimes these crazy ideas work out!
I found lots of tutorials using a Cricut. Bad news, I don't have one of those! So, I just wandered around Hobby Lobby until inspiration hit.
I was considering getting some leather and burning a design into it, but I didn't care for the selection of colors/textures they had available today. I found these Imitation Leather Felt Sheets In the craft section with the rest of the felt. I feels fairly sturdy and I can sew it on and not have to worry about poking holes. I would have preferred to use suede, but I couldn't find any today.
Now what? I've decided to just do an apple. "Over The Apple Tree" is pretty long to fit on a tag and I want to keep these small and subtle. I didn't know if it would work, but I ran this through my inkjet printer. I put some masking tape on the backside to help it grip. The good news is, it did make it through my printer without breaking it AND it printed. Bad news, the ink just wipes right off. *TIP: if your printer isn't gripping the sheet and you're getting a paper jam, try reducing the margins. For some reason when I had mine higher it wouldn't work, when I went down to .12 it went through fine.
I tried to freehand some apples with a sharpie...apples are shockingly hard to draw consistently! Back to the printer. Since I knew it would print, I lined up a row of apples and printed. Then, using an ultra-fine tip Sharpie, I traced over the printed apple. Now that apple isn't going anywhere(I tried to remove it) and I have a uniform design on all the tags.
Next, I carefully lined up the front and back of the tag and sewed it on with my sewing machine. When you cut these out make sure you leave enough space above the design for sewing.
I realize this is nowhere near the quality of custom printed or embossed tags. If you don't have a simple design like mine, it will probably come out looking pretty cheap and well, ugly. I think these look great and I feel good adding some to my Etsy products until I find some professional ones I like.
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