Rag Ball Ornaments

My parent’s Christmas tree has an overwhelming number of weird (and often extremely ugly) ornaments which I know intimately. From hideous childhood projects, to airplane ornaments that were my Dad’s when he was little, every ornament has a story and memories attached. I want to try and capture at least a little bit of that in our tree so I’m trying each year to make an ornament (or 6).  

This year I made rag ball ornaments. I cheated a little bit in that the centers of the ornaments are styrofoam rather than pure fabric but this way it went soooo quickly. I grabbed some pretty fabric while I was out and about on Sunday and then got started.

First I cut the fabric on the bias into long strips. In case you’re curious, as I was, ‘on the bias’ just means diagonally. Fabric is more elastic in the bias direction, compared to the on-grain direction, so it wrapped more nicely around the balls. When I ran out of a strip, I just used a dot of fabric glue to attach the next strip.

Once the whole ball was wrapped, I tied a piece of ribbon in a circle and then using sewing pins, attached the loop to the styrofoam. Piece of cake!

I'm really happy with how they turned out. They look old fashioned and sweet. It was a lovely Sunday. Matt was baking gigantic ginger cookies so the whole house smelled like Christmas and we watched Home Alone while I made the ornaments. I hope all of you are starting to get a little bit into the holiday spirit as well!