Some simple felt crafts for Christmas

I love crafting with felt at Christmas. Felt is so versatile - it comes in a huge range of colours, you can cut it easily into all sorts of simple shapes without needing to worry about hemming it, you can sew it or even just glue it easily, and the soft texture feels really cosy.

I've shared lots of festive felt crafts on my blog over the last few years - here are some of my favourites.

My Embroidered felt Christmas bunting is once again hanging up over our mantlepiece like it does every year. It's just large triangles of felt with a simple border using the sewing machine. Then I alternated embroidered stars and snowflakes. This was a lot easier to do than it looks - I used an outline drawn on tissue paper which I sewed through and then removed, it worked really well! 

This year I made a really simple felt Christmas garland using some leftover felt pieces. All you need to do is to cut out some simple shapes from the felt and then sew them together using a sewing machine. It's a bit fiddly at first but sews up quickly and the garland is perfect for hanging on the Christmas tree or around the house.

My Felt star Christmas ornaments were made to use up some scraps of felt in different colours that I had leftover in my felt box. I tried to pick colours that went well together, even if they weren't all traditional Christmas colours. The colours remind me of the Three Kings and their gifts! They are finished with a contrasting button. I display them in a bowl on the sideboard, but they can also be made into hanging decorations with some simple coloured thread.

This Cross stitch snowflake felt bunting is a way of displaying the tiny snowflake cross stitch patterns that I designed - you can find them here free simple snowflake cross stitch patterns. You can use odd scraps of Aida fabric to sew the snowflakes, then turn them into bunting with some felt circle frames and ribbon. They would also make lovely hanging ornaments. 

Another stash busting project is this Felt Christmas tree and bauble bunting. Not just to use up scraps of felt but also ric rac, ribbon, beads and sequins. They have a small amount of padding and are double sided so they can be hung across a window.

Finally, my favourite Christmas felt craft is these Felt Christmas stocking decorations. They are nostalgic for me for two reasons - firstly because I remember my Mum making them when I was little and secondly because they were the very first Christmas decoration that I made when I was decorating my own home. It was so long ago that I didn't even had a craft stash - I had to go out and buy the felt and beads specially for the project!

They are designed to hold a small bar of funsize chocolate and to be hung on the tree as an alternative to the chocolate foil ornaments that you can buy. When my children were little they used them as mini stockings for their favourite teddies!

I hope that you have fun crafting this Christmas!

Some of my favourite Christmas felt crafts

As I was putting out my Christmas decorations this year I realised how many of them are things that I've crafted over the years and have enjoyed bringing out year after year. Many of my favourite homemade Christmas decorations involve felt, and so I thought I'd share a few here. 

These Felt Christmas stocking decorations are the very first Christmas decoration that I made, it must be over twenty years ago now! I remember making a special trip to town to buy the felt and the beads as I had just moved out of home and hadn't yet built up a craft stash. I still have some of the beads left and they crop up from time to time in my projects, like the felt star ornaments at the bottom of this post.

They were copied from ones that I remembered my Mum making when I was little - they are designed to hold a small funsize bar of chocolate and hang on the tree as an alternative to chocolate foil decorations. The children used to use them as mini stockings for their soft toys!

Next, this Embroidered felt Christmas bunting has hung over our mantlepiece every year since I made it. It was very easy to make, just pendants of felt and some simple embroidery (using an outline drawn on tissue paper, sewn through and removed). 

I made this Cross stitch snowflake felt bunting using snowflake designs from my free simple snowflake cross stitch patterns. They were very quick to make using scraps of Aida fabric and oddments of thread. I then cut and sewed together simple felt circles to frame them. 

This Felt Christmas tree and bauble bunting is formed of four small felt Christmas trees and four decorated baubles. I loved hunting through my stash to find ric rac, ribbon and beads to decorate them with and they look lovely hung in my office window. 

My Felt star Christmas ornaments were a felt stash busting project, using up felt in different colours that I had remaining from various completed projects. Initially I had them on display in a bowl in the living room, but I've since added some coloured thread so that they can be hung from the tree.

Finally, a few years ago I received some festive ornament felt kits to review and they were lovely to do, simple enough to be completed in a few crafting sessions but challenging enough to still be interesting. If you don't have a craft stash to work from then buying a kit with everything that you need is a great alternative, and they are often very reasonably priced!

I hope that you enjoy your Christmas crafting!

Felt star Christmas hanging ornaments with buttons and beads

Lately I've been attempting to work my way through some of the crafty bits and pieces that I have in my stash. I've been challenging myself to craft with what I have rather than buying new, and I've also found that sorting through my various stashes has been a great way to kickstart my creativity. 

One of my recent makes has been these felt hanging ornaments. Measuring about 6cm in diameter, these circular decorations are made using contrasting felt star shapes and buttons and filled with a small amount of stuffing. I worked using felt from a limited palette of green, red, purple, pink and mustard (the colour scheme being determined by what I had available!). They are finished with a coloured central button and some small seed beads. I bought the beads when I made some mini felt Christmas stockings for our first Christmas tree together - nearly twenty years ago!

When the felt ornaments were complete I thought of a few ways to display them. I was originally thinking about placing them loose in a basket or bowl by the fireplace, or hanging them from some ribbon to display as bunting. But in the end I decided to turn them into hanging ornaments.

Luckily I had some lovely thick gold thread in my stash, so I used it to make the hanging loops. They can be hung from the tree, or else I might look for some mini suction hooks to hang them across the window. I really love the (perhaps unusual) colour combination and I really enjoyed sewing these ornaments together. Working with felt is so satisfying!

Hama bead Christmas wreath hanging ornaments

These simple Hama bead Christmas ornaments are made using a basic wreath design. All you need is a circular pegboard (either the small or large size) and a selection of Hama beads in different shades of green along with a few red beads. If you only have the one shade of green, that will work too, and you could use different colours instead of red for some variety. For the decorative picture behind the wreath I used old cut up Christmas cards, and added a small piece of red ribbon to make a bow for the bottom.

First you need to make your Hama bead wreaths, and they are very simple to make. Once ironed, while they are still warm, I like to press them under a couple of heavy books while they cool to make sure that they keep a flat shape.

Related post - Ironing tips for Hama beads

I chose to use a Christmas themed picture to fill the centre of the wreath, although I think they would work just as well if you left them empty! I delved into my collection of old Christmas cards which I cut up each year for making gift tags. You could also use Christmas wrapping paper, or pictures cut from festive magazines. You need a picture with a design small enough to fit neatly into the centre circle. Cut the picture to size and glue to the back of the wreath, I used white PVA glue to stick them firmly. You might also want to add a circle of coloured card to the back of the wreath so that the back looks neater, or you could even glue two of these ornaments back to back so that they can spin freely and look good on both sides.

I finished my Hama bead ornaments with a small bow made from a narrow red ribbon and glued into place. 

Then all you need to do is to add a loop for hanging. I used red embroidery floss and used a needle to thread it through one of the Hama bead holes at the top. Even if you have ironed your project more than I have and the hole has started to close you should still be able to poke a needle through, or else you can just use glue or tape to attach the string. And you're done!

If you liked these Hama bead Christmas ornaments, then you might also like these Hama bead and ribbon baubles!

For more Hama bead Christmas crafts, take a look at my selection of Hama bead Christmas crafts for children.

Disney cruise ornament exchange idea - felt Christmas stockings

This post contains Amazon affiliate links

We love cruising with Disney, and something that makes a Disney cruise stand out compared to other cruise lines is the variety of fun magical activities that you can sign up to with other cruisers. I've written before about how you can add some fun extras to a Disney cruise, and for our upcoming cruise late next year I'm planning on joining in with as much as I can.

One of the first things that I've signed up for is the Ornament Exchange. I'll be placed in a group with 10-15 other cabins, and at some point over the cruise we will deliver a Christmas ornament to each cabin and hopefully receive some back in return. Our ornament exchange has no particular rules - the ornaments can be Disney themed, cruise themed, or just a general Christmas ornament - and they can be shop bought or handmade. Even though our cruise is many months away yet, I couldn't wait to get started on making some ornaments to gift. I thought I'd show you my felt Christmas stocking ornaments with a Disney theme, in case you are looking for some Disney Christmas craft inspiration!

The decorations were very easy to make. First I found a plain stocking template online which I traced and cut out from plain paper and used to cut out my felt shapes. There are three elements - the main stocking piece, the top and the Mickey Mouse head. I had some sparkly snowflake white felt which I used for the front stocking top, with plain white for the back. Some of the stockings use red felt, some use burgundy felt, and I used black felt for the Mickey heads.

I began by sewing the two sides of the stocking together using blanket stitch, which is easy to do and gives the edges a nice finish. If you need some help with the stitch I found this great video from Red Ted Art - How to sew Blanket Stitch. Then I used a larger needle to thread some thick cotton thread through the top corner for hanging the ornament.

The top white pieces and the Mickey Mouse head are just glued on to the stocking. You can use any fabric glue or a glue gun. Gluing the white top pieces on last covers up the knot made by threading the hanging cotton through, and you can press them down at the sides to create a neat finish.

To finish off the stockings I added a couple of charms which I sewed into the top corner. I used a small anchor charm to represent the cruise (affiliate link) and a small year charm to show the year, so hopefully it will remind the recipients of their Disney cruise for years to come.

The stockings are designed to hold a small chocolate bar which will form part of the gift. I'm expecting that the majority of our fellow cruisers will be from outside the UK, so I decided to include a small Cadbury's chocolate bar which fits nicely inside the stocking. I packaged them in some Christmas cellophane bags (affiliate link) tied with ribbon. The gift tag is made from a Disney Princess Christmas card. I hope that the recipients like them!

This post contains Amazon affiliate links.