Tutorial - Milk Bottle Top Ornaments

Crafting Christmas Decorations this season or looking for stocking fillers?

Pop in and pick up some supplies for these cute and seasonal decorations, shhhhh no-one will ever guess you started out with humble milk jug lids.

What you'll need:

Plastic Milk Bottle tops 
Small piece of stitched Aida Fabric/Embroidered fabric roughly 2.5''square across
Small lengths of Bias Tape/Ribbon/Piping/Decorative Trim
Hot Glue Gun
Felt
Scissors
Cardboard

1.Take your design and trim it up to approx 2.5'' making sure the design is centred.

2. Draw around your milk bottle top to make a cardboard template then cut just in side the lines, the card piece will need to fit inside the milk bottle top easily but not be too loose.

3. Put your template into the centre of your design and hot glue gun bit by bit the edges trying to keep to a rounded shape where possible, trim off excess where needed.

4. You should have something that looks like this, it's not perfectly circular but you can poke down the edges into the Milk bottle top so don't be too worried.

Next I'm going to show you several ways of disguising the ugly plastic milk bottle top, and yes I can see the irony of swapping red plastic for red felt. If you don't mind the plastic showing then that's fine just add a ton of hot glue to the inside of the Bottle top and carefully place your stitched piece inside, hot glue ribbon around the outside of the bottle top tie in a bow and you are ready to hang it. I personally don't like the look of plastic so here are some extra steps to gussy up your humble bottle top.

Method 1: Disguising your plastic edges with piping and felt.

1. With your design glued in place add piping to the outside of the bottle top making sure that the piped edge hangs over the plastic edge and hides it. Start glueing the piping at a slant, be careful of your fingers, it`s easy to burn yourself when pressing this down.

2. Keep rotating the piping until you get back to the beginning then cross the end over the start of the piping, cut the extra off and stick down, if it`s at a funny point then just stick a ribbon over the top :)

3. Next you`re going to want to hide the edges of the piping, the bit you aren`t supposed to see, do this by cutting a strip just wider and a little bit longer than the edge of your bottle top, stick down and overlap the ends.

4. Flip it over and add a loop of ribbon for hanging, glue down then cover the whole base of the bottle top in hot glue, stick down on a piece of co-ordinating felt then cut around it, don`t be too skimpy as you`ll want the edge and the bottom pieces of felt to meet.

That`s it you`re done, one mini hangable piece of stitchery.

Method 2 Disguising your plastic edges with Bias tape, Felt and Trim.

1. I`m using a single fold piece of Bias tape for this, here it is for those not quite sure what it looks like. You just need a piece long enough to stretch around the milk bottle top and join so this is great for those of us that keep every scrap of everything.

2. Add some hot glue to the inside rim of the bottle top then place the Bias tape over the edge, the edge of the top should fit snugly inside the fold of the Bias tape.

3. Continue around until the edge is covered with Bias tape adding hot glue as you go and ensuring the rim of the bottle top stays inside the folded edge of the Bias tape.

4. When you get to the end, over lap, cut off the excess then stick down.

5. The bias tape may not fit snugly when you turn it over, if this happens just hot glue gun a little to stick it down.

6. Glue in your stitched picture. Add a ribbon loop to hang and a felt circle to the bottom as before then get to decorating the outside edge. If you`re not happy about the joining of the Bias tape as before stick on a ribbon!

7. Start glueing your trim down, don`t cut off the excess til you have glued down the whole length, no-one wants a too short length (excuse my cheeky British double entendres!, blame it on a misspent youth reading Viz!)

Couple more ways of decorating/finishing off. Add the piping then wind round some bias tape to cover up the stitching on the piping, then add a little lace trim or another decorative ribbon scrap.

Finishing off

Add a ribbon loop to hang your mini works of art, or add a pin to the back to turn in to the worlds cutest brooch or add a magnet for the worlds cutest fridge magnet.

- Emma (Volunteer)