Jan's Library

Make Personalized Christmas Ornaments

By: Jan K., The Proofer



Make Personalized Christmas Ornaments

Making your own personalized Christmas ornaments is an interesting craft project that can be as simple or as fancy as you want to make it. Not only can young children can easily do this craft, with very little supervision, but also this craft can be used as the basis for creating a very personalized Christmas gift.

To help you with this craft, I've provided free, illustrated instructions at:

http://readingroom.janktheproofer.com/makeornaments.htm

These instructions contain several pictures, so it might take several (long) seconds for the page to open. Once the page does open, then allow a few extra second for all the pictures to appear.

You'll need:
  • Clear plastic ornament (I get mine at Michael's)
  • Personal items to put in the ornament (whatever will fit in the ornament, the examples shown are beach sand and shells, a plastic Mickey Mouse, and a few birthday candles)
  • Other decorative pieces (such as the bag of stars pictured here)
  • Tissue Paper, Curl Ribbon
  • Gift Bag, Gift Tag
Open the clear plastic ornament. Insert whatever you'd like to put in it, and then put the two halves of the ornament back together. You might want to put a very small drop of glue on the flanges of the ornament pieces (the edges that overlap each other when you put the two halves together) to make sure that the ornament will stay closed. Be sure to use white glue or any other glue that dries clear. You don't need very much glue. Wipe off any that squeezes out when you put the halves together.

In the personalized ornament that is pictured in the illustrations, I've put in beach sand and a nice shell that I collected on the beach where I live, along with little red and green stars. I've made this personalized ornament to "share a little bit of Florida" with a friend who has never been to Florida. You can do almost anything to "share" a little bit of your world with a friend or family member. You shouldn't use anything that is "organic" because it will likely dry up and wither or get moldy after awhile. It is a good idea to clean the item very thoroughly and allow at least 24 hours for it to dry before you seal it in the ornament.

Here's another idea! Commemorate a special occasion such as Baby's First Christmas! Put one birthday candle and some excelsior (or shredded paper as shown in the illustrations) in the ornament. For newlyweds, seal some memento from the wedding in an ornament and loop gold ribbon through the ornament's hanger hole.

The options for what you can put into a personalized ornament are limitless! Do you know someone who simply adores Tweety Bird or Mickey Mouse? Buy a small plastic figurine of someone's favorite cartoon character or superhero and put it in the ornament.

Be clever! Literally anything that will fit in the plastic ball (square or star shape) can make a delightfully personalized ornament!

Be sure to package the ornament in a colorful gift bag. You can make this small gift look like a million bucks by using a nice gift bag and lots of colored tissue paper. Make your own personalized gift tag to put the finishing touch on your gift. For an easy-to-follow tutorial for making your own gift tags, go to:

http://readingroom.janktheproofer.com/makegifttags.htm

For more Christmas crafts, go to Jan's Reading Room, and click on the Holidays and Seasonal category:

http://readingroom.janktheproofer.com/ReadingIntro.htm