Crafting with Kids - Yarn Covered Bangle Tutorial

At the start of this month I had grand plans of spending the summer holidays crafting with my kids, and blogging about it, as mentioned in this post.  While I have managed to complete several of my own sewing projects, I have only managed to do two craft projects (not including the standard painting and colouring in small children like to do) with my girls.  Oops!

So, today I thought I would share a tutorial for yarn covered bangles, which my girls had a lot of fun completing.  It is actually a project which they have been asking me to help them with for quite a few months now, but with our usual end of year chaos and with me being unable to find the key supplies required, the project was put off until "after Christmas".  While I have titled this post "crafting with kids", I am sure that there are many teens or adults who would happily have a yarn covered bangle in their accessories box!

Supplies

Large wooden curtain rings or wooden bangles (I found ours at a local op shop after several months of searching)

Yarn from your stash (it's up to you whether you want a bangle which is all the same colour or multi-coloured)

Water-based paint in a colour to match/complement your yarn

Craft glue (PVA works well)

Scissors

1. Firstly, make sure that the curtain rings or bangles fit the intended wearer lest you end up with tears at the end of your project!  Actually, it is probably best to make sure of a good fit before you even purchase the curtain ring or bangle.  Next, paint your bangle in a colour which will match or complement the wool you are using so that small gaps are not so obvious.  If your curtain ring is varnished or has a pretty wood stain on it, you may want to skip the paint step.

2. Leave your bangle somewhere warm to dry.  Meanwhile, if your curtain ring or bangle is too narrow to squeeze your ball of yarn through the centre, cut the yarn into manageable lengths for wrapping.

3. Once your paint has dried, you can start wrapping!  Place a small stripe of glue onto one edge of your bangle and adhere the end of your yarn to this spot.  Holding onto the glued end, wrap your yarn around the ring, overlapping the glued end if you want to ensure a really good attachment.

4. Keep wrapping your yarn around the ring until you reach the other end of the yarn.  Place a little glue on the ring and firmly press the yarn end onto it.  If you are going for an "eclectic bohemian" look as my girls did, now is the perfect time to change yarn colours.  The yarn wrapping works better if you use the same type and ply of wool for the entire bangle, but this may not be an option if you are using leftovers from your stash (my mum generously donated her leftover stash to the girls for this project).

5. Continue wrapping and gluing loose ends until you have wrapped the entire curtain ring to your satisfaction.  Check all loose ends to make sure that they are securely adhered to the bangle and then leave the bangle to dry in a warm and sunny spot.

Sorry about the blurriness, I had to take this quickly before the girls grabbed their bangles back!

And there you have it - you will now have a funky and rustic accessory with which you can jazz up a casual outfit or add to your eco-chic look!  If you or your children try out this project, please feel free to leave a link to your completed bangle for everyone else to see.     :)