Is your Christmas tree already up and fully decorated? In our family, we have a real-tree-tradition, so we wait until the beginning of December to put the tree up. If we didn’t, there would be nothing left of it (only pine needles on the floor) come Christmas :-)

This post is about Christmas decorations and making your own ornaments. Have you made ornaments before?

My Christmas decorating is best described as “kid-proof” or “very eclectic”. Our kids are now at an age where I don’t have to worry much about fragile Christmas bulbs but they really like to decorate the tree with a big amalgam of different ornaments like elves, reindeers and gingerbread cookies. Each year I buy a couple of new ornaments but I haven’t changed the overall style in years.

This year, I planned on making some new ornaments for the tree myself, preferably with fabric scraps. After spending some time on the world wide web researching ‘fabric ornaments’, I decided to sew little mushrooms. I gathered some red, brown, white, and beige fabric scraps and started trying out different shapes and sizes. I’m not a big fan of hand sewing but this project does involve some … unfortunately; however, if you are making a whole series, you can cut, machine sew and stuff all your mushrooms at once and then nestle yourself in front of the television or a warm wood stove and finish off the mushrooms in a cosy setting. That makes the hand sewing so much more agreeable :-)

A finished mushroom is about 4 inches high and 2 ½ inches wide. If you want them bigger you can scale the 3 pattern pieces easily. I made a little drawing of the pieces. There is a free PDF download for the pattern at the bottom of this article.

All you need are little fabric scraps and some soft and lightweight filling.

1. Cut the pattern pieces, copy them on your fabric and cut them out.

For one mushroom you will need

If you want you can also draw a helpline on the wrong side of each fabric piece. The inner line shows you where to stitch.

2. Assemble the CAP. Grab the 4 A-fabric pieces. Clip or pin 1 side of 2 pieces together, right sides facing each other. Do this with the other 2 pieces as well. And sew along this 1 side on the 2 pairs. Cut the raw edges with pinking scissors (if you have them). Press the seams open if you are working with cotton. This didn’t work well with the thick jersey I'm using here.

3. Now place the 2 halves of the cap right sides together, match the seams, pin or clip and sew them together. Cut the raw edges of this seam with your pinking shears.

4. Now place the cap and the lower part of the cap (the gills/circle) together, right sides facing and pin together. If this is difficult for you, you can first place some marks by folding the circle in 4 and marking the folds at the edge. Then match these marks with the seams of the cap and add more pins in between. Sew all around but leave a hole for turning and stuffing. Trim the edges.

5. Turn the cap right side out and add some soft filling.

6. Let’s assemble the stem. Pin or clip 2 pieces together, right sides facing, along 1 long edge. Sew that seam but stay ¼ inch away from both edges. I marked the stitches with an erasable marker to make it more clear for you.

7. Add the remaining stem piece the same way. Clip it to both remaining edges of the piece you’ve just sewn in step 6. Sew the 2 seams. Leave the bottom open. Trim the edges with pinking shears.

8. Turn the stem right sides out and add stuffing.

9. Grab a needle and thread and close the turning hole in the cap with a ladder stitch.

10. To attach the stem to the cap, draw a circle with a temporary fabric marker around the edge of the stem and draw one with the same diameter on the lower part of the cap. The diameter should be about ⅝ of an inch. Turn over the upper edge of the stem along the line and sew the stem to the lower part of the cap with a ladder stitch, using the circle marking as a guide.

11. Add a little thread with a needle on the top of your mushroom for the hanging loop to finish off the Christmas Tree ornament.

You can decorate your mushrooms with hand stitches if you want. Make them in different sizes and colors or a whole army of red capped mushrooms. I’m getting in the mood to decorate our house. Are you?

Any questions?
Mail me an@madamsew.com or leave a comment below.

Download the printable pattern here

Have a nice day!
An
Blogging for MadamSew :-)