Home made decorations? Any ideas?

[MistletoeAndTomHardyPlease]

Hiya.

I've decided this year to try and use as many home made decorations as possible.

We made salt dough decorations for the tree yesterday and I have a big box of craft stuff and a pile of Christmas fabrics.

Any suggestions please?

thanks.

Well, when I was small, we dipped fir cones and so on in PVA and then in glitter, which was very simple but quite nice. I imagine thats a bit old hat though

talking about a bit more complex ideas,

A few years back when I didn't have kids I made little tin angels. Basically cut out pieces of metal to make a cone shape, glued them together, (they were about 3" high) and stuck a head-sized bead on the top (including a loop of sparkly thread through the hole, to hang on the tree), then painted tiny smiling faces with enamel paint, painted the metal 'dress' in nice colours, with a bit of decoration, and stuck on glittery cardboard tiny wings. And hands were tiny beads too, with a little sliver of wood in one hand, with a bead on the other end like a wand - and a sheet of music between the hands.

and I put a piece of cotton wool at the bottom of the metal dress, to look like they were standing on a cloud.

I still have them.

Sorry more like 2" actually. Very little...you can get the metal from an old cake or sweetie tin, but do be careful. I used strong scissors to cut out the shapes.

Have seen a guide to felt and fabric Christmas tree decorations- stars, crowns, trees, that kind of thing. I'll have a look and post link.

In the meantime;
Paper chains
Snowflakes
Bunting?

I've cut out strips for paperchains next Friday. and have ordered picking shears for bunting.

those angels sound lovely!

i will be stringing popcorn and dried cranberries to go on the tree, also am making gingerbread men out of fimo and angels out of wire and beads

fimo gingerbread men. genius!!!

blog.betzwhite.com/2009/12/felt-ogee-ornament-tutorial.html these look stunning in felt but i bet you can do this in card or paper as well.

our great success last year was pompoms with some glitter sprinkled on, as snowballs, and also big tissue paper pompoms.

You can make some nice ones with Hama bead and the holes are handy for puttin wire / ribbon through.

Tonight I have been mostly making:

Clementines with cloves and ribbon to hang from the tree (once dried)

And sliced clementines with ribbon to hang from he tree once dried

Cheap because I had old clementines that were passed their best, and quick and are filling the house with wonderful natural Christmassy smells

Aitch you can make those with paper - I did last year - and you can also staple 6 together to make a really big stunning snowflake.

Stain glass tree biscuits - make some biscuit shapes, cut hole in middle of shape & place on baking paper. Place boiled sweet in hole & make small hole in top if biscuit (to thread ribbon through). Cook biscuit & sweet melts in hole making stained glass effect. Wait til completely cool before removing from paper & hang from tree.

Home made choc tree decorations. Get a silicone mould, temper some chocolate (easier than it sounds) & add to moulds & place in fridge. When set, remove from moulds & decorate with sprinkles etc. wrap in cellophane, tie with ribbon & hang on tree.

felt reindeer

generic felt shapes

cheers, dewy!

I do all the usual stringing popcorn/dried clementines/pomander stuff, plus making wreaths, making holly decorations for the piano/mirrors/picture frames. Plus salt dough, fircones etc.

This year though we've also made some papier mache decorations (started a week ago as we're giving some as presents). We've made anything that can be constructed with a spherical base. Big pot of PVA glue, newspaper and a multipack of cheap balloons and we had lots of papier mache spheres. With a ready supply of poster paints, glitter, pipe cleaners, bobbles, pens etc, we've made snowmen, baubles, Father Christmas. Some we've turned into tree decorations, others we've cut the bottom off so they stand on the piano.

Bunting is easy and effective too.

I have a lovely big knitted nativity set - it was home made but not by me - a very kind friend made it for the DC .

We also have a smaller nativity set that I made years ago with the DC when my eldest was little - it came in a kit with the basic shapes that you had to fold and put together, then the DC1 coloured it all in and drawed the faces on - it's one of my favourite decorations still

What is fimo?

Safety pin angels are fab....

2DAngel

3DAngel