Sew an adorable snowy owl Christmas ornament to decorate your tree! This cute little owl would be so cute on a woodland themed tree. You can make one for your own tree using my free sewing pattern and tutorial.
Buying Christmas ornaments is fun, but my favorite ornaments are the ones that are handmade. I love being able to put ornaments on the tree that were made either by my own hands or by people I love.
We’re having an ornament exchange at work this year. And while I’ve got a couple of funny ornaments to donate to the exchange, I also wanted to make something super cute – something that people would steal and connive to get to take home.
This snowy owl is the design I came up with, and I have a feeling he’s going to be popular at the ornament exchange. I mean, look at those big snowy owl eyes and that soft snowy owl fur! And how adorable is that little bit of fur sticking up on the top of his head?
And though this looks like a complicated sewing project, it’s actually fairly simple. You just need to be comfortable sewing on faux fur. The back of the ornament is polar fleece which helps minimize the slippage that often happens when you’re sewing faux fur.
If you have scraps of faux fur and fleece in your stash, this is a great project to use them up.
The faux fur is a scrap from these tabletop Christmas trees I made a couple of years ago. And the linen I used for the wing and face is left over from the tutorial I wrote for the pumpkin pie tea towel.
Supplies
Owl body front – faux fur scrap
Owl body back – fleece scrap
Wing and face – quilting cotton or linen scrap
Beak – quilting cotton, felt or faux leather scrap
Eyes – 1 pair ½” brown safety eyes
Polyfil stuffing
Fabric glue
Crochet cord
Free Pattern – Snowy Owl Christmas Ornament
RST = Right Sides Together
Prep
This project uses fusible webbing to fuse cotton or linen on to faux fur. It’s a good idea to test this first with scraps to be sure your faux fur won’t melt with the heat of an iron. Use a pressing cloth to help minimize the chance of the faux fur melting. If your faux fur melts when ironed, you can use fabric glue instead of fusible webbing.
Trace all of the applique pattern shapes on to the back of your fusible webbing. The shapes are already reversed for you.
If you’re using felt or vinyl for the Beak, you don’t need to back it with fusible webbing. This piece actually gets glued down rather than sewn down. If you’re using a quilting cotton, go ahead and back it with fusible webbing as that will help control fraying.
Follow manufacturer’s instructions to fuse each shape to the back of the fabrics. Cut out each shape.
Sew the Owl Body Front
Follow manufacturer’s instructions to fuse the Wing and Face pieces down to the Owl Body Front, using the dotted lines on the pattern piece as a placement guide.
If your faux fur melts with an iron, you can use fabric glue instead of the fusible webbing but you’ll need to let the glue dry before moving on to the next step.
Top stitch around Wing and Face pieces close to the edges to secure.
Follow manufacturer’s instructions to install the safety eyes at the dots marked on the pattern.
Assemble the Snowy Owl Ornament
Place the Owl Body Front and Owl Body Back pieces RST. Sew around all sides with ¼” seam allowance, leaving 2” open at the bottom to turn.
Clip curves, turn right side out.
It can be difficult to turn the tail with it’s pointy end. I used a mechanical pencil without any lead in it to gingerly poke the point at the end of the tail. Be very careful when you do this because it’s easy to poke a hole all the way through when you’ve trimmed your seam allowances close.
Stuff with Poly-fil, then hand sew the turning hole close using a ladder stitch.
Use fabric glue to glue the Beak on to the face where indicated on the pattern.
Use a large needle to thread some crochet cord through the top of the Owl, right above the left eye.
Tie the cord to make a hanging loop for your snowy owl ornament.
Your snowy owl ornament is finished!
If you love this darling ornament tutorial from Anne then you are sure to love these tutorials by Anne as well:
Mug Gift Card Holder Ornament Free Sewing Pattern
Triangle Zip Pouch Advent Calendar Sewing Tutorial
Christmas Stocking with a Hidden Pocket – Free Sewing Pattern
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