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Day 6 of the 24 Days of Christmas Crafting!

The goal for these 24 days is to give you ideas for hand-crafted Christmas decorations for your tree and home. Come back each day to try the next craft. 24 Days of Christmas Crafting!

Today I decorate a strand of fairy lights with paper stars! And, because they run off of a battery, I can place them anywhere. Light up your paper projects by using LED strands instead of standard bulb light strands.

Materials and Supplies

(This post contains affiliate links to some of the items I used in this project. It just means that you will help to support my blog if you make a purchase after clicking the links. There is no added cost to you!)

Do not use standard bulbs with your paper projects. Standard bulbs (such as your typical Christmas lights) produce too much heat and can set your paper on fire. Make sure you are using lights that are specifically marked as LEDs.

To make your own strand of LED-lit stars, you will need:

• 2 sheets of yellow printer paper (standard 20-pound printer paper)
• Glue
• Pattern (available in my Resource Library)
• LED Strand — This link is to the LEDs I used. They come 6 strands to a package. My instructions are for using one strand.
  NOTE: I love these lights! I used them for the centerpieces for my daughter’s wedding (set into blue wine bottles) and for a light effect around my wrists on a Halloween costume.
• Optional: Clips for holding pieces together as your glue sets

About the Pattern

Cutting these by hand, while certainly possible, may take a while. I am doing a new craft every day this holiday so I needed something faster. I cut these on my Cricut. If you are comfortable with the design software for your craft machine, you can probably build your own design in the application. It’s just a star with a hole in the middle. The hole in the middle needs to be large enough to go over the LED bulb.

To save you some time, you can download the design from my Resource Library.

Cutting the Stars

For these stars, I wanted six points (kind of like snowflakes). I also wanted them to be three-dimensional. For each 3D star, I needed 6 cut-out stars. Since my LED strand has 20 lights, that means 120 stars to cut out.

Using 8-1/2″ printer paper, I needed to cut two sheets. of the stars. The most time-consuming part of this project was weeding the center holes off of my cutting mat.  🙂

Assembling the Stars

For your first star:

• Use six of your cut out stars.
• Score from point to point. Scoring a line on each star is not a required step but will make folding them produce a crisp fold that goes all the way to the point of the star.
• Fold each star in half.
• Apply glue to one half of a folded star and affix one half of another star to that glued area. Clip and set aside. Repeat for the remaining two sets of two.

• When the glue has set, remove the clips. You now have three pieces.
• Apply glue to one half one star and affix one half of one of your other star sets to this. Clip in place.
• Open up the remaining unglued area and apply glue to both halves. Affix your remaining star set and clip in place. All the pieces of this star are now together and waiting for the glue to set. In all of these “waiting for the glue to set” steps, continue making more stars.

Light up the Stars

When the glue has set on the completed star, remove the clips. Thread the end of the LED strand through the hole in the middle of the star and move it down the strand to the LED bulb that is closest to the battery pack. Apply a dot of glue where the wires of the strand lie against one of the points of the star. Clip into place until the glue sets.

Repeat for your remaining stars.

Happy Decorating!

After all the glue has set and you remove your clips, you can use this strand of lighted stars anywhere in your house or office to add some holiday decor.

These are some ways you can use your strand of LED paper stars!

Decorate a wreath

Insert Into a Jar

Decorate Your Mantle

These were yesterday’s Christmas craft. Today’s craft can help light up these Wood Veneer “Joy” plaques.

Decorate a Nougat Candy Tree

You can go back and make the Nougat Candy Tree and use your new lights to decorate it!

Remember to come back each day for a new project in the 24 Days of Christmas Crafting!

You can get the pattern to this and all my DIY and craft projects in my Resource Library by filling out this form.

Remember to pin this to your favorite holiday crafting board on Pinterest!