Beginner's Sewing Projects for Kids

Teach a child to sew with the help of projects that build on each other.sewing image by Lisa Eastman from Fotolia.com

Sewing is a valuable skill that stays with you for your whole life. When a child shows interest in this skill, you can help nurture that passion with easy, kid-friendly projects for her to complete. By fostering the child's desire to acquire a new skill, you will help build her self confidence, as well as personal pride when she completes a project.

Drawstring Bag

A drawstring bag is an excellent starter project because it only requires a running stitch. Your child can make a bag large enough to fit a sleeping bag for a slumber party, or small enough for coins and small toys. By completing this simple exercise, she will gain confidence in her ability while honing her fine motor skills. This project is suitable even for very young children.

A handmade sports-theme pillow project suits inexperienced hands in its simplest form, though you can also spice it up for kids with a little more experience. Kids learn to focus and also improve their motor skills while threading a needle through holes poked around the sides of both pieces of fabric for the pillow. They also learn how to stuff pillows, what material to use and how much of it they need.

While the idea is similar to the drawstring bag, this project allows children to customize their creations with trinkets, buttons and reversible fabric. They can adapt the project to fit any music player or cell phone, and add a band on the back to use as a belt hanger. While the holder looks better stitched on a sewing machine, it works fine by hand. To complete this project, a child must be able to join two pieces of fabric together, make a straight stitch and affix buttons or other closures.

Kids can recycle and re-purpose favorite shirts that they have outgrown into simple backpacks. They can adapt this sewing craft to suit any shirt that has sleeves or broad straps, and they can complete it in one afternoon. The shirt backpack makes a great beachbag and is machine washable. To complete this project, a child needs to be able to use a sewing machine for straight lines and thread a drawstring.