Felt Christmas Ornaments

 Christmas is just over a week away. How?!?! Where did December go? Where did this year go??

Despite my best intentions of being on top of things this year and starting all Christmas sewing well in advance, I've still got quite a few presents to make this week. As per usual, I will be sewing right up to the last minute most likely. However, I've already finished a few key items, so let's celebrate those wins!

My niece's Christmas dress is finished and delivered to her! (I'll show it off and tell you all about it once I get to witness her wearing it at our Christmas gathering.)

My sister's Christmas dress is finished and hanging in the closet, waiting for her to come home for Christmas. 

And I've made Christmas ornaments!

There's my niece's Christmas dress ornament of course (here's your sneak peek of her dress for this year!), but that's not all. Last year I fell head over heels down the rabbit hole of making felt ornaments. And this year I've continued with it (As I've *possibly* procrastinated on other Christmas sewing I should be doing.)

It started with the Ladies' Christmas ornament exchange at church last year. I signed to go, then decided that instead of buying an ornament to bring, I would make one instead! 

I thought a felt gingerbread house would be doable, so I gave it a shot!

I started by cutting gingerbread house shapes out of tan felt. Then I embroidered windows and doors onto the panels with silk buttonhole twist. (That's just what I happened to have in my sewing bag that worked as embroidery floss at the time. Regular embroidery floss would be great too, and probably cheaper.) I finished the embroidery portion of the project off with a Christmas tree in the back window.

Once the panels were prepared, I whip stitched them together, and sewed on the roof. Next step was stuffing the house!

I didn't happen to have any stuffing in my sewing bag at the time, so I improvised and stuffed the house with fabric scraps and a plastic bag. It works.

Plastic bag stuffing in place, I sewed the house onto it's white sparkly felt base.

I embroidered the year onto the bottom.

Stitched the two layers of the base together.

Then went to town with glitter glue to finish things off!

It was so much fun!

Once this gingerbread house ornament was done, I was hooked! I just had to make more!

Thus, I cut out two more gingerbread houses, embroidered them, and sewed them up!

Out came the glitter glue again. . . (That stuff is really quite addictive!)

And I had little Christmas gifts for both my aunt and my mother-in-law!

The ornament bug had bitten me hard, and I wasn't ready to stop yet!

So I proceeded to make a graduation cap ornament for my cousin who was graduating college that month.

And an ornament celebrating the engagement of another cousin.

Finally, I made an ornament reminiscent of the padlock my husband proposed to me with two years earlier.

It's not a perfect replica, but it's a fun memento to have on our Christmas tree!

Now this year. . .

I've come up with several more fun ornament designs! However, I don't have time to tell you all about them right now (and some still have to be gifted), so you'll have to wait to see the final results!

They've been a lot of fun to make!