Banana fuse bead pattern

About this design

The banana curves up from bottom left to top right, Yellow all over with a stripe of Lemon highlights running along its length. Single Brown beads mark the stalk and the tip. With essentially two colours plus a couple of accents, it is a very quick make, and it fits with the apple and the pineapple for a fruit set.

Bead counts: 67 Yellow, 41 Black, 9 Lemon and 2 Brown, 119 beads in all. Buy a few spares of each colour, because the odd bead always rolls away.

Placing the beads

At 19 × 15 beads the design fits on one large 29 × 29 square pegboard with room to spare. Follow the curve with the black outline first; the yellow fill is then easy.

Ironing and finishing

Ironing is a job for an adult. Cover the beads with ironing paper, set a dry iron to medium and move it in slow circles until the beads just begin to merge. Let it cool, turn it over and press the back, then cool it flat under a heavy book. At about 9.5 × 7.5 cm it makes a magnet or a play-food piece.

Colour plan

Perler 80-19003 Yellow does the most work, 56% of the 119 beads, followed by Perler 80-19018 Black at 34%. Perler 80-15269 Lemon (9) and Perler 80-19012 Brown (2) are used only a little: small details worth marking on the chart so you don't miss them. 58% of the grid is left empty.

Working notes

All the beads touch along a full side, so it irons into one solid piece.