Try This: Stitched Leather Ornaments

If you look closely, you can see me reflected in one of the ornaments on the tree. It’s a Where’s Waldo holiday edition for you. 🙂

So, Trey and I have a pretty good sized collection of ornaments on our tree already. His parents did a wonderful job of gifting (and then storing) an ornament for him every year as he was growing up. And I have a number of ornaments from my childhood as well. So, I thought it would be fun to create a few handmade ornaments that somehow reflected us to add to our growing collection.

I thought it would be fun to find a way to create ornaments that showcased the states we were born in. I’m a Missouri gal and Trey was born in the great state of Texas. If you can’t tell from the photos, these ornaments are made from leather and yarn. You probably don’t need a whole lot of explanation from me on how to make these, but you might be surprised by some of the tools used. Maybe. Let’s find out.

First, I google searched a few state shapes and printed them out the size I needed. As you can see, I went for images that also showed where the capital was located because I planned to highlight that in my design as well.

I cut out the leather using fabric scissors (using the printed paper states as my template). And then I used a cropodile to add small holes all around the border of the state.

I added stitching with a thin yarn, stitching both ways to create a border around the state. Then I added a little star to the capitals. Both Laura and Trey pointed out (and I LOVED this idea) that you could add the star where the recipient was born, rather than the capital, if you wanted to personalize it just a little bit more. 

I love this little star stamp. So cute and easy to use. Just place the leather on a super hard surface (I used the clean pavement outside) and hammer the design onto the leather. It takes about two seconds but lasts forever.

I realized these could make a fun little gift for friends as well. So I made a few based on where Elsie, Jeremy, Laura, and Todd were all born. You could also change this up and make a country instead of a state if you wanted. Easy, right? These are already hanging on our tree at home. and I love them. Can’t wait to pull them out and hang them again for years and years to come.

Credits // Author and Photography: Emma Chapman. Photos edited with A Beautiful Mess actions.