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Easy Christmas decorations ?how ? |
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We decorated our tree last night with another family from church who are
currently homeless and staying with yet another family from our church.
The mother noticed how many of our ornaments are homemade, and it occurred
to me that some amongst us who decorate trees and have younger children
might be interested in some simple ideas for ornaments.
Wax- these are pretty near the lights. We simply save up bits and pieces of
old candles and crayons. I melt all of one shade in a pie pan in the oven
on low. I take the pan out of the oven and let it cool. When the wax is
solid, but still warm and pliable we stick cookie cutters in it. We leave
the cookie cutters in until the wax is cold and hard. Then we carefully
remove them. These can be hung by threading a needle, getting the tip hot
and running it through the top of the ornament.
Origami- if you like origami you can simply make some origami birds, bows,
or whatever and run a threaded needle through them for hanging. You can
make these more permanent by dipping them in some melted paraffin. Ours are
special because they were made by exchange students, who signed them before
we dipped them in the wax.
Glitter things- these are especially good for very young children. I used
cookie cutters to trace out simple Christmas shapes (stars, angels, trees,
rocking horses, teddy bears, a simple church building shape) and cut them
out of cardboard (poster board, shirt board, the cardboard included in some
kinds of panty hose). Use a hole punch to make a hole for stringing in the
top. The small children then paint the shape all over with glue. Put some
glitter in a small paper bag (a plastic bag might work as well), and fold
over the top. Small child then shakes it hard, then pull out a beautiful,
sparkly ornament and let it dry before running ribbon through and hanging
up. I still have the soldier my now 18 y.o. did when she was 2.
Stained glass glue ornaments- trace any simple shape on a piece of
cardboard. Cover with clear saran wrap. Carefully run a line of glue over
the outline of the shape. When the glue is tacky, carefully put a bit of
thin ribbon, yarn, or sparkly trim in the glue, tracing the outline of the
shape again. Let this dry a day or two (we make about a dozen of these at a
time). When the yarn is pretty dry, fill in the inside of your shape with
glue (the glue should be touching the outline everywhere- there can be no
empty spaces within the design), then cover it with glitter. These take a
few days to dry. When dry, you can carefully peel them off and they look
lovely. We make glitter birds to hang on our tree. You can also simply put
food coloring in the glue and make stained glass type ornaments. We used
reds, oranges, and yellows and made some beautiful fall leaves to hang in
our windows throughout the autumn season.
Pinecone blue birds- mix some glue with blue food coloring (I prefer the
paste sort you find with cake decorating supplies)- paint the mixture all
over a pine cone, a bit of index card, and a small Styrofoam ball. Sprinkle
glitter over all. When dry, glue the stryrofoam ball to the small end of
the pinecone- this is the bluebird's head. Use a black marker to make eyes.
Cut wings and a tail from the index card and glue them on the appropriate
places. You can cut a beak from the index card as well (this should be
yellow), if you like.
Glass balls- buy scratched and ugly glass balls from the thrift shop. Soak
in bleach over night, use a cotton swap to get the last of the paint off.
You can put a bit of paint inside these and swirl them around, or you can
put bits of tulle, feathers, sequins, milkweed or thistle down, dried flower
petals, etc.. Very pretty.
Crochet- our 11 year old crocheted a red, white, and green chain to garland
the tree.
Paper bag ginger bread men- cut two _large_ gingerbread men from a brown
paper grocery sack. Use a hole punch to punch holes all around the edges.
Small children can sew the two sides together, just like the sew lacing
cards. They can stuff them with a bit of cotton, wadded up newspaper, or
scraps of material for a three dimensional look, and they can also decorate
the gingerbread man with paints, glitter, buttons, crayons, glue, etc..
Candy canes- they can make candy cane shapes out of red and white pipe
cleaners, of course. They can also turn candy canes into hobby horses by
making two felt horse's heads (glue them together around the edges),
decorated with bits of gold braid or rick rack, and slipped over the top of
the candy cane.
Luminarias- we can't do this here because it is so windy. But in other
homes we have colored small brown paper sandwhich bags with magic markers (I
made some that looked like houses), put sand in the bottom two or three
inches, and then put a votive candle in that. Very pretty. |
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