Felt and Yo-Yo Key Chain

Last month at our stamping group gathering we had a little swap amongst ourselves and I made these little key chains as my swap.  I was challenging myself to come up with something using the Stampin Up fabric and using some of the other "stuff" I had on hand.  I found some felt and embroidery floss and some batting and thread and set to work.  

I started by using the circle die to cut the two felt circles and a piece of batting.  This batting, by the way, was the cast off of a project that we did a few years (yes, you know I am a saver!) ago at a stamp workshop.  It was from some specimen frames that we made into shadow boxes.  Everyone at our table was throwing away the batting because we didn't need it, and I couldn't just let that happen. (If I only had time to use all the good throwaways that I've rescued!  I promise, I've been trying to purge.)

I used the white embroidery floss and the blanket stitch to sew all the layers together, making a little loop with the ribbon and catching it in between.  I secured that area by sewing two buttons to the front and back. If you had a sewing machine that worked (my new one is still in the box and waiting to be set up) you could quickly sew this together, or if you're not a sewer at all, cut the batting a bit smaller than the felt and use some fabric glue to attach the felt layers.  You could also use an eyelet in place of the ribbon loop for your metal key ring.

Out of the designer fabric I used the many circles die to punch out my circles.  I chose to use the largest of them for this project.

I know it seems tedious, but making yo-yos is really simple.  You just knot your thread (I use quilting thread) and make a running/basting stitch all around the edge of the circle and then pull and knot.  For these, I knew that the centers would be covered by buttons so I did not mind the raw edges.  If you are not adding buttons, you can fold over the edge of the circle (finger pressing helps with this) and then you have a nice finished yo-yo.

I sewed the buttons to the centers of the yo-yo's and then sewed the yo-yos to the felt circle.  You could also glue them, but since I already had the thread out and didn't want to move it was the simplest way to go.  The last step was to add a metal key ring to the ribbon loop.

This could be a keychain, or a luggage tag, or zipper pull for a child's backpack, or it could just go in the drawer and sit there until it's time to clean out the drawer and you wonder - where on earth did this come from!  Come to think of it, if you added a bit of lavendar in with the batting it might make a nice sachet for the drawer or hang it on a hanger in the closet.