I’m sure you’ve seen in popular etsy shops lately the trend of using feltie designs for paperclip toppers to make adorable placeholders in books, folders, or my very favorite – a planner!

I am a planner addict. I do not have the calendar type; I just keep a hardbound notebook on me at all times that is divided (haphazardly) into different sections, like digitizing ideas, important phone numbers, doodles and drawings, daily To-Do lists (so many lists. SO MANY lists), family appointments or reminders, etc.
Here is the planner that I am currently using. I’m pretty sure I got it at Walgreens; I have a stack of notebooks at home to use when the previous book is full so it could have been a year or more ago. 🙂

Click on the book below for a link to the Amazon listing for the book that I use; I guess since it’s not calendar-organized it’s a “journal” but whatever.

NOTE: Mine was $10 at CVS last year!
It’s a little bit of a sore subject that I lost my last planner SOMEWHERE in Nashville and I never found it; it was the one in the Amazon listing above you can see that is a neon cheetah print. Those ideas and lists are gone forever, but I’ve moved on. Really.

So ANYWAY, when I saw this trend of using felties as bookmarks or page clips I felt an irrational amount of joy. I already have some great feltie designs, I am always whipping up more, and anything that can help my little paper brain get better organized is a great project for me!
When Cyndi of Cyndi Sue Sews shared a stunning photo of my frap cup feltie used as a paperclip pagemarker, that was it. I had to craft one and share the results!

One of the most frustrating aspects of embroidery, in my opinion, is having ideas for new, fun projects and realizing that you have to purchase a digital design just to try your hand at the new craft. Recognizing this pitfall, sympathizing with my peers, and realizing that Valentine’s Day is about two weeks away, I felt like I could give away a simple heart feltie freebie so everyone could have a basic to try the project before deciding if they wanted to go nuts buying felties on etsy.
Besides, hearts are cool year-round!
You can grab my heart feltie freebie by joining my Facebook group here.
To preface my tutorial, as I always say, there are probably twenty ways to do everything in embroidery. Just because I take pictures of my methods and do the tutorial does not mean that you must do it the way I’ve suggested. Everyone has their own tips and tricks, and mine are not embroidery law. Experiment with your own projects and have fun!
I load up my heart feltie embroidery design and stitch it out as usual.
  • Hoop/clip stabilizer
  • Run placement
  • Place fabric for front to cover placement (for my heart, I used red marine vinyl from JoAnn to give my clip durability since it will be used and tossed around often)
  • Run the quick tackdown stitch 
  • Place your backing fabric behind/under your hoop and run the finishing bean stitch
Alternately, if you’re feeling froggy, you can skip the tackdown stitch by just placing the front and back fabrics on your hoop and doing the finishing stitch at once. 
Here is my finished feltie:

Here is where I deviate from the popular use of these feltie clips. I see how adorable they look at the top of the paperclip, but when I think of the way I treat my hardbound notebook, and how.. let’s say adventuresome.. daily tasks with small children can be, I just can’t imagine anything sticking out of the pages or top of the book being on there for longer than one day. So I apply and glue my feltie onto just one side of the paperclip so that it will stay inside the notebook instead of poking out. People won’t see it as much, true. But I think it will stay usable longer. That’s my opinion and it’s worth what you paid for it. 🙂
I use paper clips that I got at Kroger; they are painted with cool colors, and are a “medium” size – not the regular office supply ones but not the crazy jumbo ones. They are almost exactly 2″ long. Click on the photo below to see a similar product on Amazon:
You’re going to use a craft knife to cut a small slit into the backing of your feltie to insert one side of the paperclip inside, using a craft glue to hold it into place.
Let’s begin! Flip your feltie over and place your paper clip on top of it. 
Here is where you can eyeball the little cut you’d like to make.

I use a tailor’s chalk or china marker to mark a little line where I want to cut.

Now carefully use your craft knife to cut a slit about as wide as your paperclip. Be careful not to cut the front of your feltie!
I like to start with very gentle pressure, and then..

insert the knife in at an angle, so I’m more in control of the cutting and not bearing down straight toward the front of the feltie.

Next, bend one side of your paperclip just a bit so you can slide it easily inside the little hole you just cut. Use a hearty craft glue to put a small dollop on the rounded end. *NOTE: If you’re using E6000, be sure to open a window or do this part outdoors or in a well-ventilated environment.

Carefully slide your paperclip end with the glue inside the little slit you cut, and…

gently bend the paper clip back straight, so that you have a little embellished paperclip.

Here is what my finished paperclip feltie looks like. I don’t mind that it doesn’t stick out of the book. 
If you’re still into the “poking out the top” style of page markers, you can use these same steps, but change the orientation of the paperclip! Cool, huh?
Do you make yours a different way? Feel free to share your technique in the comments!