Forest Fairy Crafts by Lenka Vodicka-Paredes and Asia Currie

I was given an opportunity to review Forest Fairy Crafts and I was so excited when the book arrived in the mail! The cute fairy on the cover is just the beginning of all that is to love about crafting fairies! The book is laid out in easy to read sections with beautiful photography just as we expect from C&T Publishing.

The pages of the book take you from crafting a simple boy or girl fairy to creating special character fairies such as Bumble Bees, Ninjas, Angels, Witches, Warlocks, Pirates, Mermaids and more. There are also instructions for soft felt fairies that are stuffed and also Treasure Keepers which are adorable pockets and pouches to hold your fairies. The fairies finish at about 5” tall with their hats.

I asked my 11 year old daughter, Leah, to make a fairy and she was happy to help out! I had taken a look at the beginning section of the book before I headed out to the craft store so I would know what I should purchase to make a fairy. Some of the items I had on hand and others I needed to pick up. The basic items needed are felt, wooden beads (heads), chenille sticks (bodies), sequins, decorative beads, glue, yarn, needles, embroidery floss, thread, stuffing and wire edged ribbon. You can add more embellishments such as silk flowers if wanted.

The book is broken down into sections. The beginning sections include a sewing lesson with basic stitches (whip stitch, running stitch, blanket stitch and finishing knots). The authors of this book are both handwork teachers at a Nevada school for the arts. They have a nice way of explaining, in child like terms, how to create the stitches and how to create the fairies.

The next sections are all about how to make a fairy from beginning to end including how to use a pattern and how to sew on sequins and buttons. Other section titles include Body Shop, Faces, Dress/Clothes Shop, Hair Studio and Hat Shop.

The instructions for each of the fairies tell you what supplies you need and how to make that character’s body, hat and clothes. There are also extra tips and creative ideas for each. The instructions were clear and detailed with photos of each step. The back of the book had a glossary, note to adults, patterns and resources.

Leah chose the Christmas Fairy and we got right to work with red, green and white felt. We gathered all of our supplies and laid them out on the table. I read the instructions and Leah did the actual making of the fairy with little help from me. She tried out a few faces on the face workshop sheet and chose to draw the face with colored pencils. If she chose pens, we would have had to put some varnish on the bead first and we didn’t have any of that on hand. The reason for the varnish is to prevent the pen ink from sinking into the wood.

I started out stitching the hat and then Leah finished it and stitched some of the skirt detail. She could have stitched the entire thing very easily. We used a chenille needle because it has a large eye which comes in handy with embroidery floss.

Leah had fun picking out yarn for the hair and sequins for the skirt. We didn’t have wire edged ribbon so we used regular ribbon but I think the wire edged would have been nicer.
I think Leah (11 years old) is probably at the older end of the spectrum for this book. She enjoyed making the fairy and could easily do all the parts on her own which was terrific for me! I think an 8 or 9 year old could also do all the parts and might be even more into making all sorts of fairies and possibly even trading fairies with other friends. My 13 year old daughter had no interest in making one but did come over to see what we were doing several times.

I interviewed Leah at the end of our crafting session and this is what she had to say:

Me: Did you enjoy making this fairy?
Leah: Yes, I did.

Me: What was the best part of making it?
Leah: Making the hat.

Me: Did you enjoy the sewing?
Leah: Yes.

Me: What was your least favorite part?
Leah: Twisting the chenille stick into a body (we both got momentarily confused on this step but after another try, we got it just fine.)

Me: Is this something you want to do with your friends?
Leah: Yes.

Me: What is your fairy’s name?
Leah: Lucy.

Me: Were the instructions easy to follow?
Leah: Yes.

Me: Is there anything you would do differently next time?
Leah: No.

Me: On a scale of 1-10, how fun would you rate this project?
Leah: 9.

Me: Why not a 10?
Leah: Because something like Disney World is a 10.

I would have to agree with her!

This book is a keeper. The manner it is written in is kid and adult friendly and the projects are super cute. This would make a wonderful gift for a young child complete with a little box full of the basic supplies.

This book is available through C&T Publishing HERE
Also on Amazon HERE