Thursday, December 8, 2011

Bethlehem Star Pattern


I have been neglecting my blog a lot lately, but here's a new one for ya! If you are new to paper construction, I would recommend trying a different project, because this is not as easy as it would seem.

The back story: every year I like to add some handmade ornaments to my tree, and over the past few years I have been recycling my Christmas cards for this purpose. You can see a couple of them in the edges of the pic. This year, I went online with the hopes of finding a pattern for a 360 degree Bethlehem star, and had no luck! You can find one-sided and two-sided patterns, but not 'ball' shaped ones. So I came up with my own, which turned out to be a tricky bit of geometry - what exactly do you call a 14-spiked sphere where some of the spikes are 3-sided and some are 4-sided?

Anyway, here are the patterns and instructions for your personal use. The pattern printed full size makes about an 8 1/2" long star. Just double-click on the pics to enlarge. Merry Christmas and Happy Crafting!