A little while back Sarah H posted a great tutorial on making Jesse Tree ornaments here. And while I loved her set, something I have a lot of is fabric, not wood. With this in mind I created a felt ornament set that was true to Sarah’s original painted images.
Because the designs are fairly simple and not too time consuming I sewed these a few days ahead of the day they were needed on our Jesse Tree – just a simple tree I purchased from the Reject Shop.
You can make each ornament as detailed or as simple as you like.
What you’ll need:
- Felt – if you’re using the pre-cut sheets you’re going to need 4 purple, and 1 of grey, brown, green x2 shades, 2x shades blue, yellow, red, white, 2x shades brown, cream
- String – about 2.5m
- Embroidery thread in assorted colours
- Needle and scissors
- Sewing machine and white thread for the borders
- Pattern – pdf below tutorial
What to do:
The idea for each ornament is the same. First start by cutting two purple background pieces. I used two different purples, one for the front and one for the back. Set aside one circle.
Cut out the felt pieces for the ornament.
Pin onto front background piece.
Hand sew in place, starting from the bottom layer.
Add in any details (some pieces like Noah’s Ark use French knots or have other stitched details).
Cut a piece of string to 10cm and fold in half. Pin cut ends to the wrong (under) side of the finished front piece. Baste in place.
Pin the back circle you set aside earlier, to the wrong side of the finished front piece. Sew, either by hand or on the sewing machine, a border using a straight stitch.
Finished! Now on to the next one…
Click here for the Jesse Tree felt pattern!
Originally published November 14th 2017.
Originally posted 2021-10-14 14:31:47.
Hi Emily,
Thanks for this post, the ornaments look great!
I am not the most crafty person but I have decided to try making these for my family (and starting now in May so that I will definitely have them done by December!)
Just a question, what do you mean by ‘baste’ when attaching the strings to the felt? Do you use some sort of glue?
As a novice, I have found the small felt pieces quite fiddly to cut and sew so if I were to make them again, I would try to make them a little bigger. I’ve finished four of them so far and am very excited to get them all finished and be able to do this activity during Advent this year!
God bless,
Rebecca
Hi Rebecca, to be honest I probably would have made them bigger too except that I bought the small tree first! When I mention basting, you could also use tacking. Basically I mean just use a couple of stitches to attach the string so that it doesn’t move when you see around the outside of the ornament. Enjoy the crafting!