At work, we were required to set a personal and professional goal for the school year that will be tracked.  I meet with my accountability partner once a month to review my progress.  Of course, my personal goal is craft related.  (Big surprise huh?)  My goal is to learn one new skill or complete a small project each month between now and May.

September is Pom-Pom Month.

There are various ways to make pom-poms.  I happen to score this small Clover pom pom maker on a recent trip to Tuesday Morning.  The packaged instructions aren’t that great.  Here’s a video that I found helpful to explain the methodology.

A pair of small super sharp scissors is essential when cutting the yarn.  I used the “brand on sale” acrylic yarn in this example.  I made pom-poms wrapping one time, two times and three times over each arm.   One wrap fell apart, but you can see the different in pom-poms made with two wraps and three wraps in this picture:

Personally, I like the fullness of the three wrap pom-pom the best with the thin acrylic yarn I used.  Chunky or eyelash yarns might only require 2 wraps to get the desired amount of fullness.  I can already see this as an activity for my Crafty STEM club members.  We will experiment with different methods for making pom poms including using your hand, a dinner fork and a DIY cardboard template/cardboard donuts and of course, a commercially available unit.  Does technology really make it easier?  Short answer:  yes, but you don’t have to buy the commercial gizmos to make fabulous pom-poms! Stay tuned!