This article was co-authored by Lois Wade. Lois Wade has 45 years of experience in crafts including sewing, crochet, needlepoint, cross-stitch, drawing, and paper crafts. She has been contributing to craft articles on wikiHow since 2007.
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Do you love a country Christmas, with homemade Christmas ornaments and your own decorations? If so, here's a beautiful and relatively low-cost craft project that will take you around an hour to complete.
Steps
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1Obtain the needed materials.
- 3 fat quarters, or a quarter yard each of light weight fabrics in complimentary colors
- Scissors and/or rotary cutter with cutting board
- 350 pins
- A 3 inch (7.5 cm) Styrofoam ball
- 12 inches (30 cm) of inch (2.5 cm) wide lace (covers raw edges)
- 18 inches (45 cm) of 1/8th inch (3 mm) ribbon (hanging loop)
- Approximate cost to make 4 ornaments is US/CAD$10, 6 pounds (UK)
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2Cut the fabric into 2 inch (5 cm) by 2 1/2 inch (6.5 cm) rectangles. For smaller or larger Styrofoam balls, you can measure the circumference of the ball and divide by 8, then add half an inch (or centimeter) for the height and width.Advertisement
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3Place a square or rectangle of fabric on the ball and pin it in place by its corners.
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4Poke a pin through the center of the starting square and then into the ball. This will mark a starting point.
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5Poke a pin through the center of a piece of fabric.
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6Poke that same pin into the cloth covered area of the ball near the starter pin.
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7Fold the cloth down in half over itself.
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8Fold the corners down the center from the pinpoint to form a folded triangle.
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9Pin the bottom edge of the triangle with 4 pins. Use one for each end of the raw cloth edges.
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10Repeat this pin and fold action many more times, for a total of three rows per hemisphere as follows:
- 4 points touching the pole.
- 8 points in the next row, spacing the tips of the points approximately half an inch (1.27cm) below the pole, and lining the points up with the points above and the folded edges and lines with the row above. Check your measurement to see if three rows will reach the center meridian or not. Widen the distance between rows if necessary.
- 8 points in the third row should bring your raw edges to the equator.
- After three rows, if you have not reached the equator of the ball with the raw edges of your folded points, you will need to unpin and repin the rows with more or less spacing to compensate.
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11
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12Repeat the process of making rows of points from the "South Pole".
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13The ball should be totally covered by now, with a row of raw edges. The poles will appear as a "country star".
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14Pin and/or glue the ribbon or lace around the equator to cover up the raw edges.
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15Pin and/or glue a loop of ribbon to allow you to attach the ornament to your Christmas tree.
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16Graciously accept your friends' compliments and show them how you did it!
Community Q&A
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QuestionCan you tell me where I can find a pattern for a folded ribbon ornament?Community AnswerI think your best bet is at A.C. Moore. They carry patterned construction paper. If you don't find anything there, check Amazon.
Things You'll Need
- 3 fat quarters, or a quarter yard each of light weight fabrics in complimentary colors
- Scissors and/or rotary cutter with cutting board
- 350 pins
- A 3 inch (7.5 cm) Styrofoam ball
- 12 inches (30 cm) of inch (2.5 cm) wide lace (covers raw edges)
- 18 inches (45 cm) of 1/8th inch (3 mm) ribbon (hanging loop)
- Approximate cost to make 4 ornaments is US/AUD/CAD$10, 6 pounds (UK)