Thursday, August 12, 2010

castle peeps summer camp: diy travel felt board

cp playing
 Lizzy House has invited  me to be counselor for her virtual summer camp revolving around weekly activities featuring her latest amazing fabric: Castle Peeps. I could spend this entire post gushing about how much I adore Lizzy... what a brilliant, funny and loving friend she is... how her beautiful fine art is even more so in person... that she is the youngest textile designer around... yeah, see I couldn't  help myself.

But let's jump right into this latest tutorial: The Travel Felt Board! You can obviously make this with any fabric, but Castle Peeps' endearing characters and whimsical castles lend themselves perfectly to this craftivity. My five year old is so smitten that she announced: everything I ever make her should now be in Castle Peeps. Five is such a passionate age, you know.

  I'm going to give you the measurements used here, but really you can make up your own to suit your materials.
Need:
rectangle of cotton 14.5 x 25 inches
rectangle of blue felt 14.5 x 25 inches
rectangle of green felt 7.5 x 25 inches
extra felt for backing
fusible webbing (optional)
handles (tip: dark colors disguise wear and tear of grubby fingers) 6 x 9 inches
snip of elastic
button
needle
thread
2  pieces of cardboard- each being slightly smaller than the board folded in half.

Make:
  1. Fold handle pieces in half to make crease. Open. Fold both ends inward to center crease. Fold lengthwise again. Top stitch down both sides close to the edge.
cp pieces
   2. Place green felt on top of blue felt. Pin handles facing inward as shown. Pin elastic in the same direction as handles and in the center of right handle.
cp handles

3. Lay cotton right side down over the felt and handles. Pin in place.
4. Sew all the way around leaving the bottom open. Now stitch the bottom a tiny bit on each side... just an inch or so.
cp sandwich
5. Turn right side out and have a helper slide in one piece of cardboard.

cp cardboard
6. Sew straight down the center. Then add the second piece of cardboard. You might have to cut it and/or bend it a little to slip it in. Iron and pin the bottom together. Top stitch around the entire circumference. Sewing around cardboard is slightly tricky and might cause some wee wonkiness... but that might have just been me with my daughter asking "done, yet Mama" every few minutes.
cp seam
7. Make felt  castles and peeps... maybe even some clouds. Lay fabric on top of felt and cut out shapes. Stitch around the edges or use fusible webbing sandwiched between the two layers... or do both!
cp peep action
Felt sticks to felt. The green grass doubles as storage pockets! We love that part. Cleaning up is part of the fun. Don't forget to add a little button to the opposite side of the elastic loop. Keeps it all tucked in tight!

cp putting it away
Ready to go! This will be accompanying us on our next road trip...
cp travel board
Or maybe just out to the backyard!

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33 comments:

  1. Love this project! Now I need to go off and buy even more Castle peeps!

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  2. Oh my goodness I love this and so will my girl and of course we love the amazing and beautiful lizzyhouse!!! I think this will be be the project that will bring the scissors to the beautifully perfect stack of castle peeps fabric. Thank you. Love how you two work together!

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  3. I love this project! Such a wonderful idea.

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  4. this is so cute! and there are so many fun fabrics you could make different sets with.

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  5. Such a cute idea, the storage pocket hidden in the grass is very clever too!

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  6. Love this idea! So many possibilities for "characters" with all the great fabric out there today!

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  7. This is SO cute! I'd love to make one!

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  8. What a great idea!!! I may make mini-versions of these for my 0-2 playgroup at church!!!

    -Amy
    Crafting by Candlelight

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  9. LOVE this! I have twin nephews who will turn 5 at the end of this month and I've been looking for gift ideas to make them. Wheels are churning with possibilities. Thanks!

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  10. super cute!

    we once covered a huge bulletin board with felt (bought by the yard at the fabric store) with a staple gun to make the world's largest felt board.

    then we let the kids draw whatever they wanted onto felt, then i cut them out with my sewing scissors. they were incredibly inventive. it was like their drawings came alive, because they could animate them.

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  11. i used to love making felt boards inside cardboard boxes for my little ones that are not so little anymore

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  12. Love it! If only I had time to whip one up for our trip tomorrow.

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  13. Last week I tried to explain one of these very felt boards to someone on Ravelry who was looking for ideas for travel/car games for her kids. Yours is sooo cute! I love it!

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  14. Wonderful. My two little ones would love this.

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  15. Well, you put the felt board I threw together for a road trip a few years back truly to shame...

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  16. Thanks everyone! I'd love to see yours if you decide to make one too. Ours got put to great use today!

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  17. I love this! Thanks for sharing!

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  18. Love this idea - what a creative way to use your favourite fabric!

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  19. Wowzee. This is so fun - endless fun, I would imagine. The scenes and fabrics can change constantly, too - I'm thinking little animals and fairies (of course fairies....) and robots.

    Okay - after I finish sewing our Red Riding Hood Cape I'm making one of these {perhaps I'll have to make one for each of the kids; double the fun, and minus the fights!}.

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  20. Oh my gosh I'm in love! What a sweet way to use this fabulous fabric. You're so creative! Thanks tons for this, I'll be spreading the word.

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  21. Holy Moly... this is amazingly awsome. I love the castle print the fact that you can take it anywhere and you can add to it on every trip you take.

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  22. Very cool!!!!

    http://tutorialadventures.blogspot.com

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  23. This is an amazingly beautiful project we were looking for a new felt board to make since our was from a thrift store and well loved. I will do my best to try and copy this.. and I definitely need to get that fabric... amazing! Thank you so much for all of your wonderful craftiness.

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  24. What an awesome tutorial and project!

    :)
    Candy

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  25. What a great project! My girls would love to have one of these!

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  26. Indeed! That is a very wonderful idea. You have a very creative mind. It is so amazing how you think of that kind of amazing work of art. I really love that bag.

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  27. How wonderful! This will be a Christmas project. I like to make things for my daughters and for my neice and nephew -- it's hard to find one project that can suit three girls and one boy. I see a mermaid theme and a Thomas theme joining the royals and their castle.

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  28. It's an wonderful idea. You explained it very well i think every one can make it easily through your post and will enjoy this. Thanks a lot for sharing this. I definitely going to try this.

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  29. If you have a blog at hello my http://evinindelisi.blogspot.com/ for this beautiful work you would like to link to your blog, please see the appropriate Leave me a message thanks bye

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  30. I finally got around to making this for a friend and her baby boy. It turned out great. Blogged about it here:

    http://hoxholly.blogspot.com/2011/01/castle-peeps-for-baby.html

    Thanks for the wonderful tutorial!

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