Tinker straw stars yourself - 5 simple instructions

• Make a simple straw star
• The ray straw star
• Make two-colored straw star
• The pink straw star
• Making flower stars from straw

Would you like to design your window decoration for Christmas ">

The long dark winter evenings invite you to tinker a bit. Straw stars are undoubtedly one of the most traditional Christmas decoration elements - and they can be created without much time or financial effort and without special previous knowledge. Spend creative hours with your family, friends and / or children and conjure up pretty straw stars in a variety of different ways. Below you will find instructions for a simple straw star, a ray star made of straw, a two-colored ray straw star, a pointed star of straw and a strawberry star. Which design do you like best?

The natural straw for crafting can be found in any well-crafted craft store - often there are the stalks in a set with the appropriate laying form. This simplifies the laying and connecting of the blades and is indispensable for the crafting of more complex straw stars. The standard length of the stalks is 22 cm - these are available in natural light brown color, as well as in colorful. The twine can be chosen as desired, but thin sewing thread is best for this tinkering.

Make a simple straw star

You need this:

• straw
• twine
• scissors
• knife
• water
• bucket
• Kitchen paper or cloth
• Straw cutter (optional)
• Ironing board and iron (optional)

How to proceed:

Step 1: If you work with hollow straw, you need to soak it before crafting - otherwise it will break. Just take a bucket of water and put the straw in it for 20 to 30 minutes.

Tips: Cut the hollow straw once, twice, or more often before soaking to get more or less thin stripes for your stars. You can also soak the straws uncut, then get thick pieces for stronger straw stars. Use a sharp knife to cut. Alternatively, there are special straw cutters available in the craft shop or DIY store. With such a tool many thin pieces can be cut out of a stalk.

Step 2: Dry the wet stalks with kitchen paper or a cloth.

Tip: If you want to make stars out of flat straw, you can iron the soaked stems for a short time. But make sure that the pieces do not burn.

Step 3: Use the pair of scissors to cut four to six equal pieces of straw.

Step 4: Pick up two pieces and place them crosswise.

Step 5: Grab a piece of thread and tie the two straws together. How you proceed exactly is up to you. The main thing, the whole holds. However, we recommend the following procedure (which is also used for more difficult straw stars, as you will see later): Lay the thread above and below the straw - around the intersection of the two stalks. It should look like this:

Step 6: Repeat steps 4 and 5 with the remaining two to four straws.

Step 7: Lay the two to three constructions on top of each other to make a nice star.

Step 8: Grab the thread again and knot the items together in the middle. Finished!

Tip: If you wish, you can cut the tips of the straws.

The ray straw star

You need this:

• 6 straws or strips *
• Laying form with 12 cones
• rubber ring
• scissors
• thread

* For hollow straw do not forget the soaking (see variant 1)!

How to proceed:

Step 1: Print out our painting scheme or paint it. This will show you how and in what order you need to place the straws on the lay form.

Click here: To download the template

Step 2: Take the first straw and place it between the pins of the laying form where the two ones stand.

Step 3: Then grab the second straw and place it between the cones where the two stand.

Step 4: Repeat this procedure with the remaining four straws.

Step 5: Now it is time to stabilize the previous work - the individual blades should no longer slip. Grab the rubber ring and fix the last straw. To do this, first place the rubber around the top two pins next to the blade. Then pass the ring under the lay form to the other side of it. Before you hang the rubber over the two lower pins next to the blade, turn the ring around yourself - like an eight. This ensures that your work does not slip sideways.

Step 6: Tie your ray star out of straw. To do this, cut off a piece of yarn. The thread should be at least 30 cm or longer in order to use it later as a hanger. Place the thread under the stalk that you laid first. Then weave the thread with each additional blade - pull it alternately over and under it. Then knot the two thread ends tightly together.

Tip: When knotting be careful and act with feeling, because if you act too vigorously, the straws are likely to buckle.

Step 7: Loosen the rubber ring and remove the star from the lay form.

Step 8: Now weave the thread in the opposite direction around the straws. Finished!

Make two-colored straw star

You need this:

• 6 bright straws or stripes *
• 6 red straws or stripes *
• Laying form with 12 cones
• Lying form with 24 cones
• rubber ring
• scissors
• thread

* For hollow straw do not forget the soaking!

How to proceed:

Step 1: First create a simple ray star using six bright straws and the 12-peg lay-out (see manual 2).

Step 2: Now, with the six red straws and the laying form with twelve cones, make a simple star of radiation. You can also use halved stalks - with a straw splitter you can halve or even halve stalks.

Tip: The two straw stars should be about the same size at the end. If necessary, use scissors to cut them.

Step 3: Place the two stars in the large laying form with the 24 cones - in such a way that a red and a light beam alternately lie between the cones.

Step 4: Fix the upper star with the rubber ring (just like the simple ray star).

Step 5: Tie the two stars together with a thread. While doing so, take the thread alternately over the straw strip of the upper star and under the straw strip of the lower star. So if you put the bright over the red star, the thread must run over the bright rays and under the red rays. If the red lies above the bright star, the thread runs over the red rays and under the bright rays.

Step 6: Gently tie the ends of the threads together to prevent the star from kinking.

Step 7: Loosen the rubber ring and remove your straw star from the laying form.

Step 8: Now weave the thread in the opposite direction around the stalks. Finished!

The pink straw star

You need this:

• 12 straw strips *
• Laying form with 12 cones
• rubber ring
• thread
• needle
• scissors

* For hollow straw do not forget the soaking!

How to proceed:

Step 1: Place the first straw strip in the laying form with three pegs in between. In other words, two gaps remain free.

Step 2: Place the second strip in the two gaps that lie clockwise next to the first straw strip.

Step 3: The next strip is again in the directly clockwise adjacent gaps. So the whole thing continues with all the following strips of straw. Orient yourself best on our laying scheme:

Click here: To download the template

Tip: If all stripes are correctly positioned in the shape, there are two stripes in each of the gaps and the pointed star is easy to recognize.

Step 4: Tighten the rubber ring over the laying mold, so that the straw strips can not slip so easily.

Note: In spite of this subtle fixation, continue to work very gently, especially if you use fine strips of straw. One hundred percent hold by the rubber can not be guaranteed.

Step 5: Tie all the prongs together with a piece of thread.

Tip: It is also best to knot the places where the spikes intersect (near the laying form). You can either work in single stages or use a long thread to attach all intersections, so that at the end a circle emerges like in our picture. Thread the thread on a needle for this step. This makes it easier to pass between the strips of straw.

Making flower stars from straw

You need this:

• 8 whole straws *
• Laying form with 16 cones
• thread
• scissors
• 16 strips of straw (thin, green **, each about 10 cm long)
• Adhesive (optional)

* For hollow straw do not forget the soaking!
** Instead of green you can of course also use a different color!

How to proceed:

Step 1: First make a simple ray star with the eight straws (see manual 2). It is best to use our laying scheme.

Click here: To download the template

Step 2: Shorten the rays of the star to about seven centimeters.

Step 3: Gently pull the green strips of straw over the edge of an open pair of scissors just as you curl ribbon. Thereafter, the strips should be slightly curved.

Tip: Use extra caution during this step. The straw strips break very easily.

Step 4: Pick up the first green straw strip and put it in two adjacent straws - in such a way that the curvature bends outwards.

Step 5: Put the next straw strip in one of the already occupied straws and the adjacent straws. This is how you proceed with all the remaining strips of straw until you get back to the beginning and the simple ray star has become a noble blossom ray star.

Tip: The straw strips usually keep themselves in the stalks by themselves. If necessary (or to be on the safe side) you can also fix them with a little glue.

Tips for quick readers:

• Make straw stars in 5 different variants
• Classic, radial star, bicolor, pink star, flower star
• Little time (maximum 30 minutes per star)
• Little financial effort (maximum 30 Euro for several stars)
• Craft straw and laying forms as basic materials
• Additionally: thread, needle, scissors, glue, rubber ring