Paper heart basket crafts

Ever wondered how to create a woven heart basket? In this lens I will show you step by step how to craft a paper heart that can be used for decorating your christmas tree, brighten up your window or maybe act as gift label. Heart baskets can be used for many purposes.

The paper heart crafts featured in this lens are so easy to make that you can do it with your children and they will enjoy making many different colour heart baskets for your christmas tree or for decorating your home. I am sure they will even be able to find creative new uses for the paper hearts.

I have stuck to the basic heart basket to begin with, however as I get into my own christmas crafting I might add more. :)

Heart baskets are a traditional danish christmas tree ornament and is a must have on a danish christmas tree. If you are interested in reading more about other danish christmas traditions, you can check out my lens Christmas Traditions in Denmark. Enjoy and now let's get crafting! :)

Here is the full list of everything you need to make your very own heart basket for your christmas tree.

Your first step to craft a paper heart basket is to create a form to draw around. You can find my template for the paper heart at the bottom of this lens or you can create one yourself. It is best to make the form from cardboard as it is more durable.

If you are creating one yourself you will need a ruler and a round glass or a cup. Use the Glass to create the rounded part of the heart and then use the ruler to make sure the sides are straight. Make sure that the width of the form and the incisions for the "legs" for the weaving are the same dimensions, this is important for the pieces to fit together. The incisions needs to be slightly longer than the combined width of all three "legs".

Once you have your form for the heart basket, take a piece of paper and fold it with the design inside out. Then place the form and place the flat part at the edge of the fold (as shown below) and draw around it.

Picture © Mistel

In step one you drew the shape of the heart basket piece, now cut it out and repeat the process once more for the second part of the paper heart. I strongly recommend using two different looking paper as the weave will stand out much more on a heart made of paper with different designs.

Once you have both pieces cut out turn them inside out (or outside in if you will) so the design is now on the outside as seen below.

Picture © Mistel

Now you start the weaving of the paper heart. Take the left most "leg" of one piece and stick in the right most "leg" of the other piece.

See below.

Picture © Mistel

Now the next step gets a little trickier. After you have the left "leg" from the right piece inside the right "leg" from the left piece you need to take put the right "leg" from the left piece inside the the left "leg" from the right hand piece. You then end the row by once more putting the left "leg" from the right piece inside the right "leg" from the left piece. Tada, you finished the first row of your woven heart basket and should have something that looks kind of like the picture below.

Picture © Mistel

Second row is pretty straight forward. You start opposite of what you did with the first row so second "leg" of the left piece goes inside the second "leg" of the right piece and so forth.

Picture © Mistel

The final row of a woven heart basket can require a bit of fiddling to get right. The concept of the weaving is the same as described above, but there is left space. If you made sure to make the "legs" a tiny bit longer than the with of the pieces, you should have no major trouble though as shown below.

Picture © Mistel

Voila! Your paper heart should be done and look something like this.

Picture © Mistel

All that is left to do now is to cut the handle and glue it to the inside of the heart basket. And then you are ready to decorate your Christmas tree.

Picture © Mistel

Here is a template for a woven paper heart. You are welcome to use it to craft the hearts. Please don't repost the template anywhere without my permission.

Picture © Mistel

If you want a heart with a smaller weave in the middle then you can use this template

Picture © Mistel

You can also create a heart basket with the name of your children, loved one or a happy Christmas Greeting. Use this template generator to create your own customized woven heart basket.

Instructions are in danish, but it is pretty simple: Type your text into the text box, You can indicate a space with "." and a line change with ":" Grey areas are indicating something you need to cut out. Cut around the solid lines and fold at the broken ones.

Please note that the more letters you add, the harder it becomes to weave the basket.

A traditional danish Christmas tradition is to hang heart baskets on the christmas tree. Back in the days the paper hearts would be filled with raisins or small christmas cookies and once all the singing and dancing around the tree was over and done with the children could "plunder" the tree for the treats hidden in the heart baskets.

Whatever you chose to use your heart baskets for I hope you will have fun with the paper crafts and hopefully you and your children (if you have any) can enjoy making woven paper hearts together.