More Lanyards

Awhile ago, I talked about the lanyard I made for a swap and put up a sort of tutorial about making it. That Orphan Block lanyard came out pretty well and I was pleased.

As BAMQG is part of the Modern Quilt Guild, I got a pin. It has been lying on my desk and I finally decided to make a lanyard. I didn’t want to do a complete orphan block lanyard this time, because of the seam allowances. To much piecing makes lumps. I wanted it to be interesting so I used some of the larger scraps from my cutting table.

Lumps and floops
Lumps and floops

It went together pretty well and relatively quickly. Still: UGH! I don’t like the way it looks.

Fresh Fruit Lanyard
Fresh Fruit Lanyard

It is cute and cheerful and not terrible, but the seam allowances made it lumpier than I wanted. I forgot to make the upper loop insert a smaller width than the main part of the lanyard, so the lump is even more prominent.

True to form, I let the process options rumble around in my head as I went about my business and decided to make another, starting much more simply: with just one strip of fabric. I used the By The Sea by Gillian Fullard/ London Portfolio Series by Michael Miller fabric. This is the same fabric I used in the recent Ocean Going Journal.

Ocean Going Lanyard Upper Loop detail
Ocean Going Lanyard Upper Loop detail

The upper loop, which I like so the name tag is near my face and not even with my belly button, confounded me for awhile until I realized that I could make it much smoother by making it from part of the hemmed fabric. I folded up the length of hemmed fabric rather that inserting a different piece. The loop also turned out to be much smaller.

The tricky part was to make sure the metal circle was in the right place. That took a bit of fiddling and trying, but wasn’t difficult.

Of course, using the length of original piece to make the loop led to length issues for the overall lanyard. I still haven’t quite worked out the best length. Still, that little trick made a much smoother upper loop AND, and as an added bonus, prevented the loop from being too long and floopy.

Ocean Going Lanyard
Ocean Going Lanyard

Now my BAMQG pins and things are ensconced on my new lanyard and I can’t wait to give it a trial run.

Of course, I have to make another just to perfect my technique and, possibly, write another tutorial.

Author: Jaye

Quiltmaker who enjoys writing and frozen chocolate covered bananas.

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