#marble loop

[image description: a selection of handmade stim toys. Top row: orange glitter fishbowl slime; blue glitter slime; green glitter slime; pink and rainbow bead ring lanyard.

Second row: green weighted chenille sponge creature; aqua weighted chenille mop creature; purple polka-dot flannelette bean bag; glass glitter jar filled with green water and green and silver glitter.

Third row: purple-and-white-stars flannelette marble loop; red polka-dot flannelette and animal-print-faux-fur bean bag; rainbow metallic bead ring necklace on a silver faux-leather cord, black and rainbow bead ring lanyard.

Fourth row: large bead ring with seven metal-centred beads; DIY chain fidget with purple felt links; a desert-print-on-white flannelette marble maze; a purple-and-pink-owl-print-on-blue flannelette marble maze; a silver chain bracelet with dangling rainbow pony beads.

Even if you’ve never sewn before, this is a fairly simple stim toy to make. If you have issues with needles or scissors, your hands shake too much, or you have other reasons that sewing is not a possibility for you, try asking a friend to make you one, or let me know that you’re interested in buying one.

I recommend reading all of the instructions before beginning, to make sure that you think you’ll be able to accomplish all the steps (step 5 is the most difficult).

What you need:

-- embroidery thread -- a needle and scissors -- a marble or bead, the size is your choice but large-ish is likely best -- some fabric of your choice (I picked minky dot fabric, it’s super soft). At most fabric stores, the smallest amount of fabric you can purchase is an eighth of a yard, which is plenty for this project. Just make sure to pick fabric that you can easily push a needle through. -- (optional) pins

What to do (text instructions are listed first, then I include images of the steps at the very end):

1. Cut out a thin, longish strip of fabric.   -- Thickness is up to you, but a good way to figure out how thick you want is to lay the marble/bead on the fabric and make it at least double the marble’s thickness, since you’re going to be folding the fabric over it. Think about whether you want the marble to fit in there pretty snuggly or want it to have more room (mine is definitely more roomy).   -- To figure out how long you want it: as long as you want, but if you want to wear it like a bracelet, make sure the strip is at least long enough to wrap around your wrist.   -- Cut the fabric a little longer and a little wider than you actually want, you can always snip off the extra once you’re done sewing.

2. Fold the strip of fabric “hot dog” style. Important: the inside part of the fabric should be facing out! not the side that is softest and that you want on the outside -- that should be on the inside for this step.   -- I recommend using pins to hold the fabric in this folded-over shape, if you have them. If not, you’ll have to use your fingers to hold it in shape as you sew, which is what I did.   -- I also recommend making sure that the marble/bead does indeed fit inside the strip of fabric at this point; you can then put it to the side for the next step.

3. Sew the long length of the strip shut (again, only the inside-out side of the fabric should be visible); see image below for how the stitch should look. Stitches don’t have to be perfect, but make sure there aren’t any gaps big enough for the bead/marble to escape out of. Leave ends open. Make strong knots.  -- how to thread the needle in what I call “necklace style” (you can also see image 2 below)  -- you can also see this webpage (stitch 1) for how to make the stitch  -- carefully trim any excess fabric from the strip (see image below)

4. Reach into one opening on the strip of fabric and pull on the “inside” till it’s on the outside -- this is hard for me to explain, hopefully the image below will help.   -- if you are more skilled at sewing, you might hem the “mouth” of one opening on the strip before pulling it right-side-out.   -- this video has a good tactic for making an inside-out strip right-side-out.

5. Slip the bead/marble into the strip. Now you’re ready to turn it into a loop. This is the trickiest part, because you have to make both ends of the strip meet without accidentally sewing them shut. What I did was sort of shove one end into the opening of the other (think of a snake eating its own tail). I then carefully sewed them together with the bead in the middle so I could feel the center -- so that I wouldn’t sew the ends shut. The image below should help explain what I mean by this.

After these steps, you’re done! Enjoy your new marble loop (:

Images of the steps:

above: figuring out desired dimensions of the fabric (step 1)

above: folding the fabric hot dog style, with inside-out side facing out (step 2) (image also shows how a threaded needle should look)

above: what stitches should look like (see, they can be pretty messy; it’ll still look tidy on the other side) (another example of how this kind of stitch looks is on this webpage) (step 3)

above: working to “pull” the sewed strip inside out from one end (step 4) (if it bunches up a lot, sticking a pencil in might help)

above: put one opening into the other, like a snake “eating its tail”. Sewing them together without sewing the openings shut can be challenging; be patient with yourself! Make sure the marble is inside before sewing shut, of course. (step 5)