Woven Friendship Bracelet

We made this prototype to test out a bracelet for a little friend who just had a surgery.  

Materials

• Yarn (various colours)
• Cardboard
• Scissors
• Needle

Directions

• Cut your cardboard into a rectangular shape just a bit longer than the size of the person’s wrist that you want to make the bracelet for.  You may have to measure this with a measuring tape prior to.

• At the ends make small snips.  We found that they were approximately the length of 1 cm and about 1 cm apart.

• Cut a length of yarn and then start on one end on the back, leaving a little extra so you can make an anchor knot.

•  Make columns with your base colour, going sequentially across.

•  Tie your long piece onto the column beside it on both ends.

• Pick the first colour that you would like to use to make your rows.  (We find working with a length of yarn that is the size of your arm to be manageable.)  Tie an anchor knot.  (If you can, try to get it to tie underneath the column whenever you make a knot.)

•  To weave, go “under, over, under, over”, until you reach the end.  Then loop around the last column and then come back doing the opposite pattern: “over, under, over, under.”  Repeat this.

•  When you are approaching the end of your length of one colour and you are near an end column, tie the next colour onto the previous colour, trying to tuck the knot on the underside.  Snip off any excess.

•  Keep going until you reach the other end, alternating colours.

•  When you reach the end, securely knot your row yarn to an end column as shown.

• This is the portion where you may need some assistance from an adult or a friend. Flip over your cardboard to the back and snip your column yarn through the centre.  We folded our cardboard slightly down the centre to make it easy to cut  underneath.

• Remove your weaving from the cardboard frame.

•  Have an adult wrap the weaving around your wrist (or the person it was meant for) with the good side facing inward.

•  Then tie each column strand to its match as shown, making knots.  Be sure not to make it too tight so the person could slip it off.

•  Once you are done knotting, snip off any excess yarn as shown.

•  Turn your bracelet inside out so all of your knots are hidden in the inside, next to the person’s wrist.

•  Enjoy your bracelet or give to someone special!

Purpose

• Thinking of others
• Developing ones’ fine motor skills
• Creating patterns

Safety Notes

• Use scissors with care and adult supervision.
• Yarn, cord etc. can be a strangulation hazard, therefore use it with direct supervision and for its intended purpose.