Christmas Bell Birds – Sew Delicious

Hi Mandy & Sugar Bee readers! I’m Ros from Sew Delicious and today I am sharing my Christmas Bell Birds tutorial with you!

 I started Sew Delicious a few months ago to share my sewing, crafting and cooking projects. Sewing is my main love but there is always lots of variety including some fun tutorials. Make sure you pop over and visit…but first, Christmas Bell Birds!

I wanted some easy and cute christmas ornaments, and these are great because most of you crafty peeps will have all the items you need already. If you are not big on sewing or you don’t have a machine that is OK, these birds are not big and can easily be hand stitched.

You need:

– Scrap fabric
– Small bells (available from craft stores)
– small buttons for eyes
– needles and thread
– scissors
– small amount of ribbon or ric rac
– small amount of hobby fill
– bell bird template (or you can draw up your own) If you have any trouble printing the template, contact me and I will email you a copy.

Print and cut out your template. Feel free to redesign slightly if you would like you bird to be bigger, smaller or have a different shaped tail etc.

Pin to your fabric and cut 2 bird shapes. Make sure they are mirror images so the two fabric pieces align correctly when you put them wrong sides together.

Get your buttons and position your eyes to where you want them to be. Be careful not to put them too close to the edge if you are using a sewing machine, because you need to make sure your machine foot has clearance.

Stitch the eyes in place. Next, take a contrasting piece of scrap fabric and cut some wings. On the template I have given two wing shapes you can choose from – the heart shape or the leaf shape. Use whatever you like best. I use pinking shears to give a decorative edge, but that is optional.

Position your wing on your bird shapes and stitch into place. I used straight stitch but decorative stitches are great too like a tight zig zag or blanket.

If you are making your bird into a hanging ornament, take a loop of ric rac or ribbon, loop and position into place like the picture below.

Sandwich your loop between the two bird pieces so your fabric is right sides together. Pin in place.

Stitch your bird pieces together around the outside, leaving a 2″ opening in its belly.

Put your bird aside. Take your bells and some small square scraps of fabric.

Make a little pouch for the bells by sewing the two squares up on three sides.

And sew up the fourth side once you’ve popped the bells in. This is just a little safety measure – if little hands or paws manage to rip open your bird, they won’t be able to get to the bells, which would be a choking hazard because of their small size. The pouch helps position the bells in the middle of the bird as well.

Take your hobby fill and stuff your bird. When you are half done, insert the bell pouch and stuff the other half.

Turn the raw edges in and slip stitch the bird closed.

Your bird is complete!

There are lots of things you can do with them. Hang them on your Christmas tree of course! Glue or stitch them perching on a wreath.

Make a whole flock and create a garland with them. Sit them on your mantle. Add a ribbon or some christmas bling around its neck to make it even prettier! Whatever you like!

Hope you like them! I would love for you to come and visit me at Sew Delicious, I have a few more plans for some Christmas sewing tutorials in the next few weeks. In the mean time you can check out some of my other tutorials:

Thank you Mandy for having me, I love Sugar Bee Crafts, its one of my ‘must read’ blogs! Wishing you and all your readers a happy and safe holiday season!