Making a Fringe Tassel from Scratch

I have been searching for a good tassel in all of the material stores nearby. This is what I found: nada. Sure, there are 1 inch long, plastic coated, pink sparkly fringed tassels... but I'm not making a cowboy outfit for a toddler pageant. With this picture from Confetti System as my inspiration I decided to try my own fringed tassel talents. Luckily, it was easier than I thought! 

At first I wanted to make a tassel necklace, but as the fringe grew I decided I wanted to make something else. There are only 4 materials needed: string, scissors, rulers, embroidery floss. The string needs to be 100% cotton so that it can be dyed later on. (Go to the dollar store!)

The first thing to do is wrap the string four times around the ruler.

Next is to connect the miniature tassel to the row. This is easy enough by knotting the embroidery to the top on one side of the ruler. Then take the tassel off of the ruler and knot the floss to the other side of miniature tassel. Thats it!
Repeat over and over to add more and more miniature tassels onto the floss to build the fringe.

If you have never dyed cotton before, don't worry. After you boil the fringe in a cup of vinegar and water, just follow the instructions on the RIT dye. It only needed to soak for about half an hour to achieve the color I wanted!

I quickly sewed the fringe onto a stick to get the ombre effect. Let it dry for a day and that's it. Beautiful! On Thursday I'll post the next tutorial to see what I do with these gorgeous things!