This little woven bag has become one of my favorite beginner weaving projects. It’s small enough that a child can actually finish it without becoming overwhelmed, but it still gives them the experience of creating something useful from beginning to end. We’ve been doing quite a bit of handwork lately, and I’ve found that when children are first learning to weave, starting with a smaller project really does make a difference. There are so many little things happening at once. They are learning the rhythm of under and over, managing a length of yarn, keeping the tension even, remembering where they left off, and beginning to recognize when something doesn’t look quite right. A small project gives them the opportunity to become comfortable with all of those things before moving on to something larger.

For this project, we are making a little woven bag using a very simple homemade weaving board. I’m using matboard for my weaving boards because I happened to inherit quite a bit of it, and it has turned out to be almost perfect for this kind of project. It is sturdy enough to hold its shape while the child is weaving, but it is still easy enough for me to cut. You can also use chipboard. I often save the heavy chipboard that comes on the backs of watercolor pads and drawing paper, although some of those boards can actually be a little too thick. They are wonderfully sturdy, but cutting the small notches along the top and bottom can become difficult.

Cardboard will work as well, especially if you simply want to try the project before investing in additional materials. I don’t prefer it for children because it can bend fairly easily. When a child is already concentrating on learning how to weave, having a board that is moving or bending can add another layer of frustration. There are also wooden and bamboo weaving boards available that can be used repeatedly.

For a first project, I made my board approximately 11 centimeters wide by 12 centimeters tall. You can certainly make the board larger, but I really recommend starting small. Children often have much greater ambitions than we do. They see a larger bag and immediately want to make that one instead. I love that enthusiasm, but I’ve also seen how one very small mistake near the beginning can become a much bigger problem several rows later. Starting small gives them a chance to understand the process first.

Once the rectangle is cut, I measure approximately half a centimeter from the edge and then mark the remaining notches in one-centimeter increments. The notches should be as even as possible. Mine are certainly not always perfect, but keeping the depth relatively consistent becomes important later. As the weaving fills the board, you want enough room at the top to continue working the yarn through the warp. If some of the notches are considerably deeper than others, you may end up with very little room to weave in certain areas by the time you reach the top.

This is also a wonderful opportunity to introduce the basic language of weaving. The warp is the thread running vertically through the project, while the weft is the yarn that moves horizontally, traveling over and under the warp. For our bags, I used a strong embroidery thread for the warp and wool yarn for the weft. I have also used baking twine successfully. I prefer something fairly simple and strong for the warp. Decorative embroidery floss can work, but some varieties separate into individual strands easily, which can make weaving more difficult for a beginner. Most of the warp will eventually disappear into the weaving anyway, particularly when the yarn is packed tightly together.

Setting up the warp correctly is probably the most important part of this project. Because we are making a bag rather than a flat piece of weaving, we are weaving around both the front and the back of the board. The top and bottom of the weaving board are arranged a little differently so that the finished weaving will have an opening when it comes off the board. The goal is to end up with an odd total number of warp threads going around the board. On my board, I had eleven warp threads on one side and ten on the other. That little difference allows the over-under pattern to continue correctly as you move around the entire board.

I begin by tying the warp securely to the board with a double knot. From there, the thread travels down the front, around the notches, across the back, and back toward the front. I use my finger to maintain a little tension as I work. You want the warp snug, but not so tight that it begins bending the board. Once the entire board is warped, I tie it securely again. I tend to double knot everything because the last thing I want is for a child’s project to begin coming apart after they have invested so much work into it.

For the weft, I used a beautiful undyed wool yarn. I usually begin with about two or three feet of yarn. This is another place where working with children changes the way I approach the project. Too much yarn can become difficult to manage. It tangles easily, and suddenly the child is spending more time trying to untangle a knot than actually weaving. Too little yarn means stopping constantly to add more. You have to find that middle ground based on the age and ability of the child.

When I’m first teaching children, I actually let them begin weaving with their fingers rather than immediately introducing a needle. They simply move the yarn under, over, under, over, and then we flip the board and continue around the other side. Eventually the weaving becomes too tight to comfortably use the fingers, and at that point a tapestry needle or another needle with a large eye becomes helpful. A blunt needle works perfectly well. I have also noticed that a slightly sharper tapestry needle can make the final rows easier because it slides underneath the warp more easily.

One of the most valuable parts of this project has very little to do with the finished bag. It is learning how to stop and look at your own work. After completing a row, I encourage the children to look back across it before continuing. Is it over, under, over, under? Does the new row alternate with the row underneath it? If one strand is over in the previous row, is it under in this one? These small checks help children begin developing the habit of recognizing their own mistakes. It is so much easier to correct one mistake immediately than to discover three or four rows later that something went wrong much earlier.

I also remind them to push the weaving down as they go. It can look like quite a lot of progress has been made until you gently push everything together and realize there is still a considerable amount of space left. Packing the weaving down regularly also creates a much tighter and more substantial finished bag.

There is also a very simple way to thread a tapestry needle that has worked beautifully for us. Instead of trying to push a fuzzy piece of wool yarn through the eye of the needle, lay the yarn over the eye and fold it tightly around the needle. Pull the needle away while pinching that fold, then push the folded yarn through the eye. It makes threading thick yarn much easier. It also eliminates the habit of putting the yarn into your mouth to wet the end, which is particularly helpful when you are working with several children and helping them thread their needles.

As you approach the top of the board, the weaving naturally becomes tighter. This is when the needle really becomes necessary. I continued weaving until the bag was filled as closely to the top as I could comfortably manage, always checking the pattern and pushing the rows down. Then comes probably the most exciting part, taking it off the board.

I gently loosen the warp from each notch. The board may bend slightly during this process, particularly if you are using matboard or cardboard, and that is one of the reasons I consider these homemade boards largely single-use. Once all of the loops are released, the weaving slides off the board, and then you finally get to see whether everything worked. There should be an opening at the top. The bag is then turned right side out and the corners gently pushed into place. The project looks considerably smaller once it comes off the loom, which is part of the charm of it. It really is a tiny treasure bag.

For the handle, I made a simple twizzle from wool yarn. A twizzle is created by taking a long length of yarn and twisting it tightly in one direction until it wants to fold back on itself. Once folded, the two sections twist around one another and create a thicker cord. This is another wonderful project for children. You can do it together with a partner, attach one end to something stationary like a doorknob, or work in sections.

For this bag, I used a fairly long length of yarn because I wanted a longer handle. Once the twizzle was finished, I tucked each end about an inch and a half into the inside of the bag and stitched it securely in place. Because this is a small woven bag, it isn’t meant to carry anything particularly heavy, but I still want the handle attached securely enough that a child can actually use it without worrying about it immediately coming apart.

I could have stopped there, but I decided to experiment with naturally dyeing the finished bag. I had already prepared a pot of red onion skins in distilled water. Initially, I thought I might create a combination of yellow and green, but once the bag was finished, I decided to put the entire thing into the red onion dye bath. The color at first was much softer than I expected. Then I added the mordant and the color began shifting toward green.

I’ve used this same process with other wool yarn and achieved a really beautiful olive green. This particular fiber didn’t absorb the color quite as deeply or evenly, so I returned it to the red onion skins to see if I could deepen the color a little more. After a few days, the bag had developed a lovely green tone with some natural variation throughout. It wasn’t completely even, but I actually don’t mind that at all. That variation is one of the things I love about working with natural dyes. You don’t always know exactly what you are going to get.

The finished bag is just large enough to hold one of our little wet-felted wool balls or a few treasures collected by a child, and I think that makes it just right. It doesn’t need to be large or elaborate. For a beginning weaver, there is something incredibly satisfying about taking a piece of yarn, working slowly through the rhythm of over and under, watching the fabric grow, removing it from the board, adding a handle, and ending with something they can actually use.

Handwork gives children the opportunity to experience that entire process. They make mistakes. They notice them. They correct them. They work through moments when the yarn tangles or the weaving becomes tight. And eventually there is a finished object in their hands that did not exist before. That is so much of what I love about these projects. They are simple, but there is so much happening within the simplicity.

If you would like to make your own woven bag, I have included the weaving board template to accompany this project. You can also adjust the dimensions once you become comfortable with the process and begin experimenting with larger bags, different yarns, handles, and natural dyes.

Shopping List

• 100% wool yarn

• Heavy-duty cotton thread

• Cotton kitchen twine

• Matboard

• Chipboard

• Cardboard weaving boards from Blick

• Wooden weaving board from Walmart

• Large-eye tapestry needles

• Large-eye sharp tapestry needles

• Scissors

• Ruler

• Pencil

• Red onions

• Distilled water

• Mordant for natural dyeing

• Turmeric

• Shallots