Homemade Holiday: Recycled Felt Garland

A colourful garland that re-uses your scraps of material. (You could use paper scraps too!).  Decorate a mantle, tree or doorway.

Materials

• Felt scraps
• Embroidery floss
• Needle
• Wooden beads
• Threader/thimble (Optional)
• Scissors

Directions

• Cut a length of embroidery floss.  We found that approximately the length of one’s arm was manageable.

• Thread your needle.  For young children (and adults too!)  a threader may be helpful in this process. Make a knot at the other end of your embroidery floss.

• Sew through the larger portions of the felt, kind of folding it.  Repeat.  You could go with a pattern, should you like depending on your scraps.

• Add beads it between sections of felt.  This could lend to patterning if you went with a few colours or sizes.  We went through the beads several times to hold them in place.

• When you are near the end, make another knot to hold every thing in place.

• You may want to tie several lengths together to form a longer garland.

• We braided the ends and added a few beads to make it easier to hang.

• Enjoy!

Purpose

• Re-using materials.
• Patterning (you could use different attributes such as of the colour of your beads or fabric.)

Safety Notes

• Use scissors and needles with care and adult supervision.
• Beads can be a choking hazard.  Be sure to keep them out of reach from children 0-3 or those that tend to put things in their mouths.
• String type materials can be a strangulation hazard and are not meant for play.  Use with supervision.