My daughter Maude/Mimi prepared this Friendship Bracelet How-to for you. Here’s what she says:
I love making these for my friends — both boys and girls like to wear them. Sometimes I wear just one, and other times I like wearing a whole bunch. I like wearing them as anklets in the summertime.
Once you get the hang of it, this is a really good activity to do while you’re watching a not very good movie. Grown ups can make them too, but I think this is an awesome activity for kids age 8 to 14.
1) Gather your materials (see the picture above). You’ll need scissors, embroidery floss in 4 colors (for the bracelet pictured, I used blue, purple, green and lime green) and a clipboard. If you don’t have a clipboard, you can also use a safety pin pinned to your jeans, or even a clothes pin.
2) Cut lengths of all four colors. For a bracelet, 21 1/2 inches is a good length. If I don’t have a tape measure handy, I just use the length of my arm for a measurement. For anklets, or for grownup wrists, you’ll need to cut the threads longer.
3) Tie the threads together in a basic knot.
4) Tuck the knot under the clip and spread the threads apart. Notice the order I have them in — blue, green, lime green, purple — because the order will change during the lesson.
5) Take the left thread (the blue one) and cross it over the next thread (the green one) in the shape of a 4.
6) Take the blue thread and loop it over and under the green thread. Keep the green thread nice and tight with one hand and slowly pull the blue thread until it makes a knot at the top — right by the clip.
Repeat this again — blue over green.
7) Next do the same thing twice with Blue over Lime Green. Then do the same thing twice with Blue over Purple. Now, your blue thread will be on the right side instead of the left.
8) Repeat this process, starting from the left. Green over Light Green twice. Then Green over Purple twice. Then Green over Blue twice.
Then the same thing starting with Light Green on the left.
Then the same thing starting with Purple on the left.
Then the same thing starting with Blue of the left again.
After you’ve done the Blue one three times, the bracelet will be about an inch long and look like the photo above.
9) Every time you get about an inch done, move the woven part up under the clip and it will be easier to work with.
10) When you’ve woven about 5 inches, it’s time to finish it off.
11) Tie the bracelet around your wrist — I like to use a square knot (left over right, then right over left). You might want help because it’s hard to do with one hand. Trim the ends.
Tada! You now have a friendship bracelet.
When I first started making these, they took me awhile — like an hour, and I made lots of mistakes. But I practiced and now I can make them in about 10 minutes each.
I hope you enjoyed the how-to!
Love,
Mimi
Awesome! My daughter would love this. Thanks, Mimi!
Love it! I still love to make these and I am way older than 14 :)
Thank you!! The clipboard is genius …
Mimi! The clipboard is a genius idea. In the eighties I tied them to chairs and that forced me to stay in one place always, which can get dreadfully boring.
I made so many of these in middle school but I’d forgotten how to do it. Thanks for this great tutorial, now I can show my daughter how to make them!
I love that friendship bracelets are still in after all these years! :) Thanks for the great tutorial for this forgetful mind!
That is the cutest! And a very well written tutorial. Good job!
Merci Mimi for this tutorial.
It’s been too many years since I last made a friendship bracelet. I think my six year old son is too young for this project. Who knows? If I could get him to make one, imagine all the quiet time in my house ;-)
Bises
D
Wow, these bring back memories. Use to make these all the time when I was younger. There was another style I also use to make but can’t remember how it was done. This was a great tutorial. Good job Mimi!!
So glad friendship bracelets are still around!
I’ve been telling my daughter how fun these are to make, but I think you just convinced her! Yay!
This brings back so many memories – I made hundreds (not kidding) of these back in the day! Our rule of thumb, though, was once you tied it on, you couldn’t take it off until it fell off! :-)
I used to make these!
there was also one that we made where we anchored them to our big toe. I don’t remember how those were made. but I do remember tying them around my toe!
thanks for the memories, Maude. I can’t wait until my daughter is old enough for this.
Love it! When we were kids, we either tied them to our toes or pinned them to our jeans while we worked. Thanks, Mimi – I’m going to show this to my younger cousins – I bet they’d love them! :)
Great job, Mimi!!
I loved making these, too, when I was a teenager, but could not at all remember how! I am going to save this for when my daughter is old enough. Thanks so much!
I love this tutorial! But I’m not sure it’s an official friendship bracelet if it’s not safety pinned to your jeans during the making process! :-)
How did you manage to get not only the clipboard and the floss to match, but your SCISSORS too?! :)
oh my god, I remember doing this one when I was…let say, more young!
I used to make these when I was 13. I will show my 13 year old how to make them now ♥
My whole entire life I have wondered how to make these. Seriously. My daughter, Emma, is 11 and she will love to make them as much as I will.
how awesome! i used to whittle away my summer days making these, and landyard bracelets, but i forgot how to do it! this is definitely motivation to pick it up again when i’m watching a not so good movie!
Thanks for sharing Maude! I used to make hundreds of these when I was 11/12. It was great fun.
This is a great tutorial! I loved making friendship bracelets!
sure duper good job and cute clipboard and color choices!
*super* duper
Great tutorial, Mimi! Merci beaucoup.
Nice job, Maude! I used to love making these, especially during summer road trips. Fun photos too!
I can’t count the number of friendship bracelets my brothers, friends and I made! We also liked to use a safety pin in the knot to clip it to our jeans, couch, seat of the car, etc. (I promise we didn’t damage anything!) We started getting creative and making other designs by working right to left, skipping strategic ones, etc. Glad to know nothing has changed!
Great tutorial, Mimi.
Love it :) I use to make these when I was your age :) Here is something you can try on your next one!:) Take some seed beads and thread them onto the string, knotting them as you usually do, (one each on the middle strings) after you get about half way through. You can make them into a pattern and put as many as you like!
Love it! I remember making tons and tons of these with and for friends! Today I have been looking for ideas for my daughter’s birthday party – we’ll do these! Thanks!
This is terrific! Thank you for the lesson — now I’m wondering if I can get my boys to make them!
oh my this reminds me so much when I made these some couple of years ago :)
I would not have known how to make them now…thanks for the reminder :)
so so cute! how fun that you had your daughter teach this! i’m going to show my 7 year old daughter elena – she’ll be tickled pink!
Awww… I used to do this when I was little. I loved those bracelets back then!
So cute, Mimi! I helped my nieces create these a couple years ago and so many middle school memories immediately came flooding back…
I think I used to tape my floss down to a table or piece of sturdy cardboard. Love the clip board idea and the embellishments to it. Great job!
Awesome! I remember pinning them to my sock while I was sitting on the floor. Brings back great memories. Thanks :)
Well done, Maude!
lovely tutorial! I like the colors you chose.
oh gosh, memories flooding back of making these in endless numbers poolside in the summers! i also used to do the hair wraps where you do the same four-stitch around a small patch of hair. too funny!
This brings me back to car trips when my sisters and I made so many of these! I think this is a fancier braid, though. I would love to try it and the clip board is a great idea! We used to safety-pin them to the car seat in front of us. :) Have you ever tried adding charms as you go? Thank you!
I used to make these all the time but had since forgotten how. Thanks, Mimi! :)
Thanks, Maude! My daughter is 9, and I know she’ll love doing this!
thank you for the tutorial! i just started making one last night for craft hope. they are collecting bracelets for orphan outreach to send to kids in russia. read more about it here: http://crafthope.com/2011/04/project-12-orphan-outreach/
First of all, this DIY takes me right back to summer camp! I love friendship bracelets!
I’m so proud of your kids for putting together such a great post! Thank you for encouraging them! I can’t wait to see more.
I loved making these as a kid, and now my daughter that’s your age makes them. I love it!
And you did a very nice job writing the tutorial!
I used to spend hours and hours doing these… brought back some great memories!
this is a great tutorial. i’ve tried to teach to people how to make friendship bracelets in the past and it’s always difficult to describe the knots in particular…making the string in the shape of a four is a perfect description!
also, I think there is a typo on the length of string needed: shouldn’t it read “For a bracelet, 2 1/2 FEET…” not “inches”?
that reads 21 1/2 inches
Thanks Mimi! Great tutorial! I used to make these all the time – maybe I should break out the stash of embroidery floss and get to i! I’m sure my friends would love them.
Sara and I made these last night. Your tutorial was perfect! I have instructions to buy every color embroidery thread that I can find at the store today. Thanks!
Your kids are awesome :)