Does your Christmas tree have a theme? My Christmas tree’s theme is “kid creations”. I am a sucker for all the cute handmade and picture ornaments. My kids paint or create several ornaments every year, and they are my favorite ones on my tree. If you saw my reindeer hands post, you got some tips on how to craft this season (and survive) with little ones. Here is a craft you can try out those tips. My Christmas Ball Ornaments are easy enough for a toddler to make.
Start with some ball-shaped ornaments. I used glass ornaments, but I would think plastic would work really well with this method as well. I cut up a bunch of tissue paper into about 1″ long squares or rectangles. I gave my kids some glue and showed them how you put a dab of glue on the ornament and then stick a piece of tissue paper on it, and let them run with the craft.
A full collage of paper tissues over lapping one another is ideal, but my J simply wanted to create a row of paper around his ornament and be done. That works too. Reagan used a Q-tip to apply the glue on her ornaments which was easier for her little hands than to squeeze the glue bottle like the boys opted to do.
Once my kids said they were done with their ornaments, I applied glue all over the outside of the tissue paper. This step pushed down all those fly away pieces sticking up and got them to lay flat on the ornament.
Our ornaments were then wet, so I quickly slipped in some string and hung them up to dry. This prevented any part of the ornament getting ruined and not drying onto another surface.
Once the ornaments were dry, I sprayed them with my favorite clear shiny gloss spray from Rust-oleum. I love the shine that this spray added to our ornaments.
The last step was to add some string, ribbon, or embellishments to make them unique and special to you. I added bells and feathers and even a little star with the date to one of ours. Note: I did this step without the kids help. 🙂
Our ornaments were then done and ready to be given as gifts or hung on the tree! Soooo have you gotten to craft or make any presents yet? I hope you are able to unplug, relish in the normal simple things, and enjoy this season.
Happy week friends!!
Love might not be an easy thing, but this sign sure can be an easy way to express it!
is cute too!
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in the back (so it can hang on the wall), and my sign was done! I love how it was quick and easy. It was rather cheap (since I only had to buy the letters), yet it’s a fun thoughtful gift!
Do you love to give handmade gifts too? What are some crafts on your list? I’m hoping to paint Reagan some peg wood dolls. She is not into big cloth dolls but all the little plastic figurines, so I figure I am going to try to paint her some wood ones. If I am successful, I will be sure to let you know!
If you like to be crafty, most likely these are all items you already have on hand too.
Start wrapping your yarn around the picture frame. I didn’t bother adding any more glue until I reached the corners. I then placed a small amount of glue and laid my string on top. Wait a few seconds to allow your glue to dry, before you start wrapping again. If the glue has not set, most likely it will not hold its place. I did this process a few times to get me around the corner.
Continue to keep wrapping until you get to the next corner. You then add more glue to get you around that corner-just like you did before. Just wrap and wrap. If you look closely at my corners you can see that I layered some yarn on top of other wrapped strands. Do what ever you need to, to cover those corners well. The string is gorgeous and you will create the same look no matter how many layers it takes to wrap it. The point is to cover up all the ugly brown frame.
Once I was done wrapping, I thought the yarn frame looked pretty cool by itself. You could hang it up right then as a fun piece to add to a wall collage. I thought a paper mache letter would look cool hanging inside.
I then set my picture inside and hot glued a few small felt pieces around the back of the frame to hold it into place. The back no longer fit down into the little grove because of all the string. I figured this little system worked, and when I want to switch out the picture, I can just rip off the felt and redo this step.
I love how it came out. I especially love the contrast of my black and white family picture that 
