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Home Made Quick Christmas Crackers

Quick Christmas Crackers

Fill your own Home Made Quick Christmas Crackers with personal gifts

Rather than spend  money on glitzy crackers with plastic gifts that you throw away, make some Home Made  Quick Christmas Crackers and fill them with little gifts that are personal to your family or friends. They really are quick to make and can be reused year after year.

 

MATERIALS

  • 29 x 17cm cotton fabric (11 ½” x 6 ¾”) – based on using loo roll inner as cardboard tube
  • 11.5 x 16cm of wadding (4 ½ x 6 ¼”)
  • Ribbon/lace trims, at least 5, each 17cm long
  • 60 cm of ribbon for  ties (24”)
  • Inner cardboard tube (loo roll, kitchen roll or wrapping paper inners are perfect).

Sandy MacCaw made several beautiful crackers from my quick steps

TIPS:

  • Cut the fabric with pinking shears to give a fluted edge to the crackers
  •  To determine fabric for different tubes, measure the circumference of the tube and add 15mm (5/8”) seam allowance.
  • If using a loo roll inner, microwave it for 5 secs to kill any germs.

 

To make up your Home Made Quick Christmas Crackers

  1. Find the centre of the fabric panel and pinch press the centre. Find the centre, lengthways of the wadding and, matching centres place wadding over the WRONG side of the fabric. Machine stitch down the side edges to anchor the wadding in place.

Another of Sandy MacCaw’s crackers.

  1. Place the first of your trims centrally on the fabric and machine stitch in place down both long edges using a straight or zigzag stitch. Add other trims either side as desired. (It looks nice if there is a trim about 4cm (1 ½”) from either end).

 

  1. Fold the decorated fabric, right sides together. Moving the needle to the far right, stitch the seam taking a minimal 5mm (1/4”) seam. Turn through and insert cardboard tube.

TIP: Start stitching about 15mm from the end, then reverse, and continue forward so that any thread ends are not at the very end of the seam.

 

  1. Cut the ribbon for ties in half to get two lengths of 30cm. Tie one a around one end, close to the tube. Fill the cracker and then tie the other ribbon to the other end.

I love the luxury gold version made by Sandy

Voila – your cracker is made.