These mini felt bags will be a winner for every little person who likes to take their figurines on big adventures.
EVERYONE needs a bag to put the their ‘essentials’ (content may vary!) in right? Here’s how you can make (and personalise) your own:
Getting started Making Mini Felt Bags
Level of difficulty?
Easy! Anyone who has a basic knowledge of hand sewing will be fine. (Others will probably be too – there’s always YouTube!)
Time frame?
Most people will have their first mini felt bag ready to play within half an hour.
What you’ll need:
- felt: think about your colour scheme now (little people can have big opinions!)
- needle: regular needle and embroidery needle (with larger opening)
- thread: any single stranded thread will do
- embroidery floss (or yarn) (colours!)
- scissors
- measuring tape
- models: the mini felt bags in this tutorial are the perfect size for ‘adult’ Playmobil and Duplo people
- to personalise your mini felt bags you might want to use any old buttons, beads, sequins, or any other funky craft resources you’ve got laying around
Step by Step Instructions
1. cut out a felt rectangle, dimensions: 2,5cm by 4,8cm or 1″ by 1.9″
2. if you want to personalise your mini bag, now is the time: fold the felt rectangle in half so you know where your little piece of art should go
3. cut a piece of embroidery floss and tie knots on both ends so that the space between the knots is 11,5cm or 4.5″
4. cut another piece of embroidery floss, tie a knot on one end and thread your needle on the other
5. take your folded piece of felt and insert the needle in the bottom right hand corner of the fold in the felt, going from the outside to the inside and pull through so the knot sits against the felt
6. make a loop by inserting the needle on the other side going from the inside to the outside
7. pull your embroidery floss through until the the space between the knots is 11,5cm or 4.5″, you can measure this against the other piece of embroidery floss we made earlier
8. tie a knot exactly where you want it to be (this is the finicky bit), I always secure part of the thread between my finger to ensure the knot stays where it needs to go
9. when finished, trim the tassels evenly, by now your mini felt bag should look like this:
10. now we’re going to close the sides with a blanket stitch, working from the bottom to the top, making sure we are including the embroidery floss ‘handle’ in our stitches
11. when getting to the top, I’d recommend going around the embroidery floss that is coming out, to nicely secure it in place
12. close the other side the same way
13. done! sit back and admire your work:
Personalising your Mini Felt Bags
Now that you know how to make a basic mini felt bag, nothing is stopping you from making it your own and taking it to another level. You can have fun with beads, sequins or try out some fancy embroidery stitches.
While the mini bag we just made is designed for Playmobil and Duplo people, you can easily adjust the design to fit any size figurine you want. Have a think about how big or small the bag can be and how long your handle needs to be, try it out and adjust until you get it right.
And finally: Play!
Children love to tuck away little treasures and these mini felt bags are perfectly suited for just that! Have a look in and around your house for little things that you can put in these mini bags (and would make a lovely present!) or to give to the children to play with. Anything shiny is always a winner!
If you like projects like these, you’ll probably love some of my other mommy projects:
- how to turn your child’s art work into an embroidered keepsake
- how to make felt chocolates for pretend play
- how to make an embroidered treasure map designed by your child!
- how to make an “ocean ceiling” to hang under your table
- how to make fairy hair braids for pretend play
- how to make felt sleeping bags for figurines
That should keep you entertained for a while! And if you are ever in need of more inspiration, have a look at this Pinterest board.
Thanks for your time today and take care!
Ann*
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