How to Make Felt Hair Clips
If your daughter is tired of pinning her hair back with the same shiny metal clips day after day, jazz up the hair accessories with handmade felt accents. Create the interchangeable embellishments in favorite shapes like hearts, flowers or butterflies, in colors that coordinate with your daughter's outfits or other fashion accessories. The technique is so easy that you'll be able to create sets of personalized hair clips as birthday party favors, holiday stocking stuffers or gifts for classmates.
Things You'll Need
- Felt
- Shape stencil
- Black marker or tailor's chalk
- Scissors
- Sewing machine or needle and thread
- Bobby pin, hair clip or barrette
Instructions
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To make a flower, for example, trace a 1- to 3-inch flower shape onto a piece of felt using a shape stencil and a black marker or piece of tailor's chalk. Cut the shape out with sharp scissors. Repeat the process with a contrasting color of felt so you'll have two of the same shape, but in different shades.
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Cut another shape to layer on top of the flowers with a stencil, marker and scissors. Consider a flower shape that's half the size of the base flower, or a 3/4-inch circle, to become the flower center. Use a contrasting color of felt to create the shape.
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Use sharp scissors to cut two parallel, 1/2-inch-long slits in the center of the felt flower that will sit on the bottom.
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Layer the three felt pieces. Twist the two flower shapes on the bottom slightly so they're not stacked directly on top of one another. Place the smaller flower or circle shape on top.
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Secure the three pieces together using a sewing machine or needle and thread. If you're hand stitching, use a simple running stitch---thread the needle, knot the end of the thread, pull the needle up through the felt pieces and push it down through the felt, creating 1/8-inch long stitches all the way around the shape.
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Slip the top of a bobby pin, metal snap-style hair clip or plastic barrette through the two slits in the bottom of the flower shape to secure the felt flower to the hair accessory.
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Tips & Warnings
When you'd rather not machine or hand stitch the felt accent, simply attach the three felt shapes with fabric glue or adhesive dots.
If you're having trouble seeing the marker or tailor's chalk line on the felt well enough to cut a precision shape, cut the desired shape out of scrap paper instead. Hold or pin the paper shape against the felt and trim the shape with sharp scissors. You can also cut the shape out of wax-coated freezer paper and iron it to the felt---the shape will stick, allowing you to cut the shape and peel off the paper without leaving sticky residue.
You can use the same process to create accents for the embellished hair clips out of cotton fabric or flannel.
