Spoiler alert: Joanna, don't let Nicholas look over your shoulder at this post! Disaster could befall!

Okay, now that that's out of the way, here's my latest craft project. I made a felt board for my nephew, who's turning 4 next month, and whose birthday is usually very close to or on Easter. See for yourself. You get to unwrap it, just like he will when we see him next week.


Here it is all wrapped up. I sewed a large piece of fun yellow fabric on the back of the felt (incidentally, the same yellow fabric I used to make the border on my grandmother's quilt), then tacked a piece of ribbon along the edge so it can be tied up. I realized as I was tacking on the ribbon that I'm not sure whether Nicholas knows how to tie a bow yet. Maybe his parents can step in for that part at the beginning.


Here's the board all unfolded, with the little pouch of felt goodies. Sewing the pouch was, as Amy of angry chicken would put it, the swear-y part. Some of you may have seen my Facebook status yesterday. I lined the pouch with a different fabric, and it came together decently, but I made it much more complex than it needed to be, and then I had the button-holer to contend with. I've used the button-holer about three times, and I always forget the steps involved so I have to reteach myself each time. My test fabric had three malformed button holes on it before I got it right.


I love doing zigzag stitching in a contrasting color of thread, so I bound the fabric around the front edges of the felt with orange thread (the same color I used to sew the blue starry pouch).


Here are the felt pieces practically spilling out of their pouch. Are you excited yet?


And here it is, all set up for an Easter egg hunt. Can you find all 9 eggs and virtually put them into the basket?

I'd strongly encourage any of you with creative tendencies to try your hands at making a felt board. It's incredibly cool, and it's such a modular little project that the same board could be used for all kinds of sets — food and dishes, flowers, faces, fairy tales or other stories — the possibilities abound. I've seen a lot of people staple felt onto a corkboard or other similar lightweight board, then mount it on the wall at kid height, in case you're afraid of the sewing part but would still like to draw and cut shapes with felt.

With all the baby and kid gifts I've made over the last few years, I've come to realize that I enjoy making unique projects much more than making the same thing or the same kind of thing over and over. (Feels like the story of my life right now... always switching gears, never content with the same job, etc. At least I like my husband well enough to stick with him forever.) Another Easter egg felt board would be fun, but it wouldn't be AS fun as this one was to create. I'll have to surf around for other felt board ideas, though. These things are fabulous to fiddle with once you get a good idea in your head.

Labels: craftiness, family, holidays

• posted by erica 2/26/2009 08:32:00 PM
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