DIY Sheet Music Angel Ornaments
Hello, Graphics Fairy friends! I’m Diana from Dreams Factory and I’m happy to be here again to share another DIY project with you! Today, I will show you how to make these adorable DIY Sheet Music Angel Ornaments, which might look complicated, but in fact are super easy to make! We’ll use a special type of paper to make them, which will bring sheerness and delicacy to their final appearance. We’ll start by folding the paper accordion style, which will create the base for our beautiful angels. Then we’ll perform a few other folding techniques to make the wings. And finally, we’ll use a few ‘improvised’ items that you might already have around to create the halo but also add a few gold touches here and there.
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I’m sure you already know by now that whenever I want to bring some sheerness to my projects, I always reach out for my trusted friend, tracing paper. You can print it as needed, this type of paper has rapidly become one of my favorites! I’ve been using it more and more these days and I simply love it! It’s so versatile and the final results are absolutely amazing! For this specific project, this special paper not only looks or feels perfect to the touch, but it also delivers when it comes to functionality. Its sheer transparency allows us to create paper angels that look great on both sides, without actually having to print the design on both sides! 
I experimented with a few different music sheets from the Graphics Fairy and I finally decided on this one. It doesn’t necessarily have a Christmas theme, but it looks great for what I envisioned these to be. When paired with the tracing paper, the subtle cream background of the music sheet will make the angels look vintage and quite unique!
You’ll need to print this printable once to create an angel, so if you want to make more, print it as many times as you need!
Free Printable:
DIY Sheet Music Angel Ornaments Supply list:
- tracing paper
- home printer
- scissors
- knife
- Glossy Accents, paper glue stick or double-sided tape
- round wooden beads – to create the heads
- gold keychain split rings – to create the halo
- gold washi tape and gold thread – to create the embellishments
- gold marker (optional)
Step by Step Tutorial:
I’ve decided to keep the printable without any borders, just in case you have one of those newer borderless printers. You may need to make a few settings on your printer, even if you have one or not, such as ‘shrink to fit’ or ‘fit to page’, to make sure you perfectly adapt the printable to your needs.
Print the printable on tracing paper and use your scissors to cut off the excess white paper around the edges. It would be best to place the paper on a darker surface, if possible, as this makes it easier to see and remove the white edges.
Fold the paper in half and use your scissors or a knife to cut along the folded line – I found it easier to use the knife here. It gives better results, especially since the paper is already folded.
You will be left with the two pages needed to create our first angel!
Take one of your pages and place it on your table, with the printed design facing down on your table. We’ll start from the back of the paper and from the bottom and we’ll use the highlighted music notes as guidance to make our first fold upwards. As you can see, even if the printed design is facing our table, the sheerness of the paper allows us to see the design underneath. So cool, right?
Keep the first fold …well, folded. I only unfolded it so you can better see the music notes that I mentioned.
Now, flip the paper so that the printed side faces you and use the folded segment as guidance to make another fold on top.
Keep folding the paper accordion-style, following the same technique – always flipping the paper and alternating the printed and unprinted sides. If everything goes well, you should have a total of 11 folded lines and 12 final sections.
This is how your finished accordion-style paper should look, if folded and then unfolded. Here you can better see the 11 folded lines and 12 final sections.
I highlighted the glue lines in yellow, so you can see them more clearly.
You can see that, depending on where you fold the wings, you will be able to make taller or shorter paper angels! If you make the wings longer, you will have shorter angels. And if you make the wings shorter, you will have taller angels. You can do both to create variation and add uniqueness to your project!
Add the hanger element (I used gold metallic string) and use the area that we left unglued on the top to tuck it in and secure it with glue.
Pull the string through the wooden bead and use more glue to also secure the bottom of the head to the paper. Depending on the glue you are using, you will need to press for a few seconds or even longer to make sure the bead stays in place.
Then you can start adding the other embellishments. I added the improvised gold scarves first and then some gold string bows that I quickly whipped together. Since these were quite small, I had to use toothpicks to secure them in place, which was a win-win situation because it also kept the glue away from my fingers.
Have fun making as many of these paper angels as you want, the final results will bedazzle you! All my angels turned out absolutely amazing. I can’t wait to hang them everywhere for the holidays so I can admire them all day long!
There are a few things you need to keep in mind while creating them and the first one is this: please don’t stress too much about making them perfect! I think this would be the best advice I could give you for this project.
I have to confess I was a little concerned that my accordion-style paper techniques were not as great as I had initially hoped, because some of the folded areas turned out smaller while others were larger. Let’s just say tracing paper has a mind of its own and makes things slightly … not challenging, but different. In the end, I was really happy (and quite relieved) that it was not a big issue. You will see that even with all these small imperfections, they still turned out amazing, nonetheless.
While making the angels, pulling the string through the wooden bead head proved to be quite challenging as well. So you can use a crochet hook if you have one around, it will make your life so much easier!
You might think this project is quite long, but in fact it’s not! I only wanted to properly document all the steps needed to give you all the insights on how to create these stunning little angels for the holidays. You will see that the process itself is uncomplicated and quite fun! Even addictive, I would say!
I actually got so excited about finishing them that I completely forgot to use the gold marker that I had initially planned. You can use it if you want, on the accordion-style folded lines, before gluing everything in place, it will make them even more charming.
Use the steps that I shared as guidelines to cut, fold and glue the angels, then have fun further embellishing them as you feel inspired! The scarves can actually dictate the whole direction of these beauties. You can make them from gold washi or wrapping paper, but feel free to improvise if you don’t have any around. Use acrylic paint, watercolors or even some gold nail polish to paint scrap pieces of cardstock or other materials that you have around. Neutral or colorful scrap pieces of fabric, ribbons or even some lace would also work great here. Use whatever you have around, depending on how you are envisioning your angels to look!
And even if we have so many great alternatives to further decorate the angels, I want to show you how beautiful an unembellished one can look. Just in case you prefer to keep things simple, just know that you can, if you like them this way!
This is actually the back of one of our angels, you can see the tracing paper in all its glory here. If we were to make these using regular paper, the back would be white and not that appealing. You can use regular paper if you want, but you’ll need to perform a double-sided printing just to make sure you go around that.
This is one of my beautiful paper angels and me, holding hands (and wings). Hehe.
You will see, if you decide to make this project, that the process itself is quite relaxing. And definitely rewarding. If using the tracing paper, I would say that the final look and feel of these beautiful angels, once you touch them, is a mix of a vintage book page and an old, waxy parchment. Which is quite intriguing, because it makes you wonder what it is.
So make these truly unique pieces to display in your home, use them to uplift your Christmas trees, or, why not, even your holiday spirit. They could also make great embellishments to your Christmas presents this year!
I hope you enjoyed these DIY Sheet Music Angel Ornaments. You might also like some more Sheet Music Ornaments HERE.
Happy crafting,
Diana / Dreams Factory
Lori says
This is adorable. Do you spray or otherwise treat the paper when you are finished to make sure the paper keeps its form?
Karen says
I don’t believe that Diana did spray it. You could certainly experiment with that on a sample piece to see how that works out for you. Have fun making these!