Craft Felt Jigsaw Puzzle

Felt is so cheap and pretty easy to work with, and with my scraps I came up with a felt puzzle for Elliot to enjoy at church or in the car.

Here’s what you’ll need:

pattern/shapes for the design
craft felt in various colors
Sharpie marker
fabric marking pencil or chalk wheel
scissors
crochet thread and needle
craft crazy eyeballs
glue gun
rotary ruler and cutter

Step 1 Trace and cut out pattern pieces with felt. I cut my design from the Everyday Paper Dolls Cricut cartridge but you could use whatever designs you have (geometric shapes, letters, numbers, etc.) Your design should be big enough that each puzzle piece will have part of the design in it.

Step 2 Embellish individual elements of the design as needed – I gave my monkey and giraffe eyes with a hot glue gun and crazy eyeballs and mouths with red crochet thread and a needle.

Step 3 Edgestitch each piece to a whole sheet of felt.

Step 4 After all the pieces are sewn into place, turn it over and draw with a fabric pencil or chalk wheel where you’ll be cutting to make the puzzle pieces. I did square pieces, but you can do jigsaw shapes or whatever you want.

Step 5 Sew 1/4″ away from each line you just drew on both sides of the lines. I moved my needle as far as it would go to the left and then lined up my lines with the right side of my standard presser foot. Doing this will give each puzzle piece a stitched border, which you’ll need to keep the felt securely in place. Remember – you only stitched around the outline of each shape and you’ll be cutting them apart. This step will ensure that each piece is one flat layer.

Step 6 Cut into pieces along your lines with scissors or a rotary ruler and cutter. If you used crazy eyes or any other embellishment, make sure they are not in the path of your cutting lines. If anything is on a cutting line, re-mark that line lightly on the front and cut around the embellishment.