Remembering How To Make Friendship Bracelets

As a child I would spend hours making friendship bracelets for my friends and myself but I haven't made one since the 90's. I have been trying to re-learn how to make them and thought I would share.

1. For this bracelet I'm going to use four colours as I'm just starting up and don't want to get too complex. To measure the length to cut the threads I take a length hold it up to my nose and pull it down to my finger tips, then do it again as I'm going to loop it at the top so I want one length long enough to be two strings in the bracelet. It's always better to have too much thread than not enough. I do this for each colour and after cutting them to the same length I put them all together fold them in half and tie off at the top with a simple knot to secure them all together leaving enough thread at the top to tie the bracelet around my wrist when it's finished. I have taped the loop to the table to hold the bracelet in place while I work on it. You can see from the picture that I have mirrored the coloured threads on the left and the right.

2. Threading a friendship bracelet is really simple. Just take the first sting on the left and use it to loop around the next one along, pulling the string up to the top firmly. This forms a knot at the top of the 2nd thread. Do this twice before moving on to the next string. When you get to the middle stop and do the same with the thread furthest to your right.

3. In this photo you can see I have done a run of each colour . The purple has been brought to the centre of one side and I am starting a loop from the right hand side.

4. When the colours meet in the centre take the left thread and loop it twice on to the right and then these two threads have swapped sides. Once you have done the middle you can move on to the next colour.

5. Keep threading one colour at a time in rows.

6. When I got to about half way through (the bracelet goes half the way around my wrist) I tied one knot in the centre of the purple row and then slipped on a charm before doing the second knot and carrying on.

7. I have finished my bracelet off with a simple plait either end which I can tie together to fasten around my wrist. Now I'm off to experiment with different colours and threads. If you want to have a go you can also do a more simple striped affect by just using four threads and going in one direction. We sell a great Friendship Bracelet Making kit with lots of coloured threads, instructions and a wheel to slot your threads in to make it easier.