Now that Valentine’s is over, I can safely  move on to Easter.

I mean… well, full disclosure, I have had the materials for Jameson’s Easter basket since this time last year. It’s been sitting in the craft room, under the table, just waiting for a night like Friday night.

Friday night, my eyes were really dry from taking the dry-out-your-sinuses medication (the good stuff), so I didn’t want to watch much TV or read. What better thing to do than whip out my new (year old never used) glue gun and create Jameson’s Easter basket?

I had even pre-printed the directions from Factory Direct Craft (my favorite go-to online craft store).

Before I begin, I should mention that the materials I used were hard to find last year. Apparently they were discontinuing jumbo loopy chenille. Last year when I heard it was being discontinued I actually bought enough to do two, maybe even three, Easter baskets. Ahem. But lucky for you, apparently some colors are still in stock this year whaddayaknow.

My Easter basket is extra large, so I used some extra of the materials. Here’s how big my basket is:

That’s the same basket, last year, with Jameson inside it. He wouldn’t fit this year though, so I guess I didn’t have an excuse to wait on this project any longer.

Here’s my materials:

basket
2 hanks (6 yards to a hank) of green jumbo loopy chenille
1 hank of white regular size loopy chenille
1 – 4″ styrofoam ball (after you add the chenille on, it looks like it’s 6″ big)
1 – 1″ white pom pom
2 – big googly eyes
1 – craft stick (aka popsicle stick)
floral u pins (for added security with the glue gun)
hot glue gun

Step 1: Your popsicle stick is going to be the base:

You need to secure that popsicle stick with glue. You’ll be using a lot of glue.

Step 2: Then you stick the ball on top of the stick. And add a bit more glue.

Step 3: Now you get to start wrapping the head. I started with some glue and a floral pin to keep it in place, and just added glue periodically as I wrapped from the bottom up.

Step 4: Once I reached the top, I didn’t cut the chenille. I decided to just use take another floral pin there and go ahead and make my ears (less glue needed then, right?)

I eye-balled the size I wanted the ears, about 6″ long or so. I cut the chenille and glued it down.

Step 5: Then I cut about 10″ or so of the loopy chenille twice, for two cheeks (aka bunny’s muzzle). I made my cheeks a bit bigger after I did the initial 6″ recommended by the directions on Factory Direct Craft because it didn’t seem proportionate to my large basket.

Lots of glue.

Step 6: It’s up to you, but here’s where I went ahead and glued the eyes and nose on, just to make sure everything looked good size-wise.

Step 7: Then it’s time to do the arms. I did my arms with the second hank of green chenille in one go. I wrapped around each handle twice, then secured it with what else – glue – at the back, with the popsicle stick and the bottom of the styrofoam ball.

Step 8: Don’t forget the feet! I did the feet in one swoop as well. In my opinion, the less cutting, the more secure it is, right?

The only way the feet are secured with with a lot of glue, so I tried to glue at major points/seams in the basket where it was structurally more sturdy. I wasn’t too concerned with amounts that way, I just started wrapping until one foot looked big enough, then looped over to do the other foot.

Step 9: The only thing left at this point, you may notice, is the white of the ears and the tail. I used my while chenille and cut two pieces so they’d fit inside the ears. Since I had regular sized chenille instead of jumbo, I doubled the length and folded it in half. You wouldn’t need to do that with jumbo size.

Step 10: For the tail, just take some more white chenille and roll it in a ball. And glue!

You’re all done!

Optional Step 11: You can add ribbon for a bow or whiskers or whatever you like. My mom made a version (much smaller) than this for my Easter basket that I had when I was growing up. Mine was white in the palms of it’s feet, a white muzzle instead of colored, whiskers, and googly eyes with eye lashes.

Correction from my mom: My mom didn’t make my Easter basket (cause I’m not the favorite haha). My grandpa’s cousin made the basket (and also made my mother’s manger scene).

This project was super easy, and I can’t believe I waited a year to do it. I only got hot glue on my fingers twice when doing the white chenille inside the ears.