Recycled Ribbon Awards

Assortment of award ribbons

The week between Christmas and New Year's seems like a good time to recycle ribbon from holiday gifts, whip up some awards, and distribute them to unwary recipients for a variety of reasons or no reason at all. Add some old smashed, rusted bottle caps and we've got a winner—a whole bunch of winners. These are pretty, lightweight, and will provoke a fair measure of social interaction when worn as a brooch. Since the materials are completely recycled, you can start by awarding one to yourself for being so virtuous. First some sample awards, then a how-to guide.

Close-up of gorgeous, rusted bottle cap

Close-up of bottle cap

And now for the how-to:

First, sort through your ribbons and find one piece of wide ribbon 12 inches long, and a piece of narrower ribbon 10 inches long. Form each piece of ribbon into a loop and seam the ends together as shown below. Then stitch along the inside edge of the loop, pull to gather, and secure with a knot.

Make gathered ribbon loops

Cut out a piece of felt the same size as your bottle cap.

Stitch felt to back of the wider, 12-inch gathered ribbon.

Gathered ribbon stitched to felt

Turn to right side. Place second, narrower, ten-inch gathered circle on top of the first and stitch as shown below (but wait to glue bottle cap on until the very final step).

On back of pin, sew pin clasp in place (you could always use a safety pin in a pinch), and sew down trailing ribbons. The trailing ribbons can be any length and width that pleases you.

As noted, the final step is to glue your bottle cap onto the front of the award. I've used silicone but a glue gun would work well. You could use something other than a bottle cap, such as a button or other found object.