Simple Felt Ornaments are a Great Way to Practice Stitching

The other day I came across this pin on Pinterest, which is an image uploaded by a user of a simple embroidered felt Christmas ornament made all the more lovely with the addition of quite a lot of seed beads.

On further browsing I also found this one, also a user upload, but it made me think of stitch samplers and how this would be a super cute thing of a kid (or someone of any age learning embroidery or cross stitch) to make for the tree.

To do it, just cut out two rounds of felt, probably a few inches across. Embroider or cross stitch random stitches, or make a design like a tree, heart or star. You might want to stitch your name and the year on the felt piece that will be the back.

Add embellishments such as buttons or beads as you like.

Hand sew the two pieces together, adding a little stuffing as you go, and a ribbon at the top for hanging.

These would be so fun to make with a group, it could even be an activity you work on at your holiday celebrations!

[Photo via Pinterest.]

Looking for more Christmas Cross Stitch patterns? Check these out on Etsy.

The cross stitcher behind the blog Sirious Stitches is quite into biscornu.

If you’re not, a quick primer: biscornu are three-dimensional cross-stitched objects with eight points, often with an indention in the middle that makes them look a bit like doughnuts without the hole. They can be just about any size and subject you can think of. They’re often used as pincushions but can also be seasonal decor or just decoration for any time of year.

I’ve got a collection of biscornu cross stitch patterns here.

Once you’ve stitched one or several (they are a little addicting) you might wonder what you can add to them to make them even more extra.

It very much depends on the design of your biscornu and the look you are going for, but Sirious Stitches has a great post all about some of the options you might consider.

I don’t want to give you the whole list because you need to go visit and see all of their great biscornu they’ve stitched, but one really easy thing that you can do with a lot of designs is take advantage of that center indent by adding a button, beads, silk flower or another embellishment.

This is great to do just with a basic button from your stash that coordinates with the design and colors of the cross stitching, but it’s extra fun if you have a button that’s on theme, such as a leaf for a fall biscornu or a flower shaped button for a floral design. Add a jingle bell to a Christmas pattern, or a charm if you don’t have a button that coordinates.

Just this one idea is sure to get you thinking about ways to embellish biscornu (not to mention other cross stitch projects) but head over to Sirious Stitches to see all of their ideas for embellishing biscornu to make these already fun projects even more fun.

Have you ever made biscornu? I’d love to hear about it!

[Photo: Sirious Stitches]

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