Merry Christmas! I have been recycling old Christmas cards into ornaments for years. I just love taking the beautiful old cards and repurposing them.
It is very easy and children especially can enjoy recycling the cards and crocheting around the edges. Here is the instructional tutorial on how I recycle the cards into these ornaments.
Also be advised that if you don’t want to crochet around the card edges, you can always use a craft needle and yarn to whip stitch around the edges for decorating.
Here are some of my creations for 2018.
I saw this cute granny square tree ornament and just knew I had to try it.
The tree on the right was the first one I crocheted. I had trouble with the pattern and couldn’t get my stitch counts to come out to match the pattern. So I improvised and did my own thing to get the tree to come out looking okay.
I reached out to the pattern designer Squibbly Bups for the Granny Christmas Tree pattern to figure out the pattern as written. I heard back from her and found out she counts the Ch-1 as stitches so that is why I was off on my stitch counts. I re-worked the pattern which is the tree ornament on the left.
I also changed up the base of the final row on the tree to just work
Here is a new crochet pattern for a mini 6 inch long Christmas stocking. This pattern uses the waistcoat stitch. I love the look of this stitch as it appears to be a knitted sock when it is really crocheted. Here is a link to a waistcoat stitch tutorial to help demonstrate how to crochet this knit-look stitch. I also found doing graph images can add a nice touch to a crocheted waistcoat stocking.
I have been practicing this stitch and I must say it is a bit hard to master. It is very dense and finding the V space to crochet into can be difficult. I found a larger crochet hook helps and crocheting in bright light makes it easier too. One important tip to pass along is to go slow and have patience as you crochet this stitch. I also found that the more I practiced the stitch, the better I became so keep at it if you find it difficult.
In working the heel in waistcoat stitch, you have to cut the yarn for each row. I found in future stockings I crocheted that it was easier to work the heel in regular single crochet stitches. It also helps so the heel isn’t so pointy looking. I have included both options below in the written pattern. So if you want to do the whole stocking in the traditional waistcoat stitch you can or use option 2 below.
Waistcoat Mini Christmas stocking pattern
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5-1/2 to 6 inch Mini Christmas Stocking
H (5 mm) crochet hook – 1 ounce of medium weight yarn (50-52 yards)
Chain 3 and join to form circle or you can use a magic circle.
Here are recycled Christmas cards I crafted into ornaments. These are promotional cards mailed out to advertise Christmas cards that can be ordered. I glued the cards back to back to hide the advertising on the reverse sides of each card. The cards are so pretty and different companies mail out several sets to us each year.
By cutting out shapes from the cards and using a big craft needle and yarn, these make beautiful Christmas ornaments. This is a recycled craft that children especially can enjoy as you just need to stitch around the holes and tie a long strand of yarn at the top for a hanger.
Here is another style of trim I made by crocheting around the edges of the card using a small C crochet hook. I did 2 single crochet stitches in each hole and just worked my way around the ornament. The small crochet hook works best as it fits through the punched holes.
Here is my picture tutorial on how to recycle old Christmas cards into ornaments. Just follow my step by step process
Here are a few Christmas ornaments I made from old recycled Christmas cards. I save Christmas cards and those sample cards you get in the mail. I cut out to shapes and glue them together. You can either make them bigger for decorating on a tree or package. You can also make smaller ones that can be used as gift tags.
For more details on the process you can read my original craft post on Recycling Christmas Cards into Ornaments.
Here is one before picture shown below
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