Homemade embroidered felt numbers

I love crafting with felt, it's so easy to work with and you can buy felt in such lovely bright colours. I made these embroidered felt numbers partly to help Harry with number recognition, and partly because I thought they'd be fun to make! They were very quick to put together, cutting out the felt was the time consuming and fiddly part.

Felt numbers to teach counting

To make a template for the felt numbers I chose a font that I liked (Verdana) in Word and enlarged it on the screen. Then I just traced over the numbers onto scrap paper. They are made from two pieces of felt cut to the shape of the number, one side is embellished and then they are sewn together. To embellish them I used a variety of sequins, beads and embroidery in contrasting colours. Because they are quite tactile you can run your fingers over them to trace the shape.

Felt numbers to teach counting

You could also add magnets to the back of the felt numbers, or back them with cardboard to make them a bit sturdier. I'm hoping that they will be useful to teach him to recognise numbers and for counting games.

Now for the next project - a felt alphabet!