It is time to trim our family’s annual Christmas Tree. I am a softy when it comes to vintage homemade Christmas Tree Ornaments and insist on making my own ornaments just about every year. I love to color-coordinate my tree and build upon the ornaments for 3 to 5 years before switching it up to another color scheme. Last year, Marie and I made the old-fashioned no-sew quilted folded fabric Christmas ornaments. Did you see how elegant and timeless they are? If you didn’t then you need to check that video out. The quilted folded fabric ornaments took a significant amount of time to make, so I am happy to use them a few years in a row, however today’s tutorial you can make in hardly any time at all. This year I am adding the no-sew Scandinavian folded fabric star Christmas ornaments made from the same fabrics that I made last year’s ornaments from. Luckily I still had some of the scrap fabric left and doubly lucky that the fabrics I selected are so timeless that they were easy to find at Joann Fabrics for another year.
The concept of the Scandinavian Folded Fabric Star is not a new one to me. In grade school and junior high in the late 1980s and early 1990s, I made these stars out of chewing gum wrappers while sitting through school. I am sure I drove my teachers bonkers, but since I had straight A’s and they knew it was either allow me to keep my hands busy or deal with my never-ending talking they let me play away.
If you were one of my teachers and are reading this 30 years later I’d like to apologize!
Selecting and Preparing Coordinating Fabrics:
Step 1: Choose a selection of fabrics that you like together. This is a great way to use scraps of quilting cotton that you have leftover from projects. I am using the same fabric that I made last year’s ornaments out of so that they coordinate with my tree. All of my fabrics have variations of the following colors; Cream, Red, Green, and Gold.
You can coordinate the fabric selection of your stars in one of 4 ways. Your stars may be made of all one color, there are two methods to use 2 colors, or you may use 4 colors.
Step 2: It is time to cut our fabric. In the video, I made the medium Scandinavian Folded Fabric Star Ornament, however, I am providing you the dimensions for three different sizes. I have all three sizes of star ornaments on my tree.
Small Star: 3″ x 13″
Medium Star: 3 1/2″ x 13 1/2″
Large Star: 4″ x 14″
If you would like to make smaller or larger stars you can use the same dimension increments. Just add 10 inches to whatever width of fabric you cut to get the appropriate length.
Step 3: This is an optional step, but one that I found to be quite useful, especially when making the larger stars. The step is to use a fabric stiffener to stiffen the fabric before folding and ironing the fabric.
I used Stiffen Quick, but there are other options available.
To use the fabric stiffener you will spray both sides of the pre-cut fabric and then set it aside to dry. If you are impatient for it to dry you can grab your hairdryer and speed up the drying process.
The fabric stiffener helps the stars to endure the test of time and hold their shape for a very long time.
Step 4: It is time to iron the stripes so they appear as if they are double-fold bias tape. Iron in half, then fold the edges into the center, and iron again. Finally, fold in half a final time so that all of the raw edges are folded into the center and not showing.
I seriously adore this little iron. It is not much bigger than my hand and so easy to use. It is absolutely perfect for craft projects.
Step 5: Fold the strips almost in half, so one end is about an inch longer than the other.
Weaving and Folding the Scandinavian Star Ornament:
Step 6: Lay all of the strips with the shorter ends facing up and start weaving them together, so that each strip is sandwiching the previous one. Pull the ends of the last strip through the loop of the first. Pull the strips taut. It should now hold together on its own.
Step 7: Flip it over, and weave the long ends together as you would a cardboard box. Pull the strips taut again. It should now be folded and feel as if it has a double thickness.
You may want to iron each side of the woven fabrics. This is optional, but if you watch the video you will see me iron regularly during this project.
Take a moment to inspect the anatomy of your star ornament. You will see that one side will have a thin strip while the other will form more of a pocket.
Step 8: In turn, fold each of the strips into a triangular point. I begin with the 4 ends that have the thin strip in the back and the pocket-like area in the front. I show this in detail in the video. Begin with folding into a triangular point backward, then fold forward. measure the remaining length against the 1/4 section of fabric and trim. Then tuck the long end of the fabric into the pocket-like space to secure it.
I like to use tweezures during this step because if I use my fingers and thumb it has a tendency to pull and tug on the fabric which stretches it out more than I like.
Finishing the Scandinavian Folded Fabric Star Ornament:
Step 10: This is an optional step. I like to use fabric glue and secure the inside of each point as well as the long end that was tucked into the pocket. I allow the glue to dry, or as long as it has not leaked out I use my iron to rapidly dry the glue. You know me, I hate to wait.
Step 11: We need to attach a hanger. Use embroidery floss or a thin sock yarn to sew on a loop, then hang it up! I like to use green floss because it blends into the tree, but you will also see that I have used coordinating colors to the ornaments. Both are stunning.
These ornaments are a lot quicker to make than most ornaments!
