Christmas Ornaments

After seeing so many great ideas on Pinterest, I had decided that for Christmas 2012, we would make homemade, homespun style ornaments for our Christmas tree. We worked on a lot of the ornaments together as a family. Here are some of the projects that we did.

Cinnamon Applesauce Ornaments: I mixed together equal parts of cinnamon powder & applesauce. I used 2 cups of each. We then rolled out the dough and cut it with a star cookie cutter and cut a hole in each with a straw. The boys helped, and we had so much fun laughing together. As you can imagine, with 2 teenage boys playing with brown dough, they had a little fun with inappropriate "piles" of dough on the counter. We all thought that a strategically placed "pile" would be fun to do at school on April Fool's Day. Oh, if only it didn't smell so much like cinnamon...

The stars were then placed on the trays of the dehydrator. We had them in at approximately 120 F and left them in over night. The house smelled so good the next morning!!

 This is what they looked like when they came out of the dehydrator the next morning. They smelled wonderful!

The cinnamon stars needed a bit more personality, so I hot glued wooden buttons from the dollar store, then tied hemp twine and a 1 inch strip of homespun fabric to each of them. I love the look! So cute & country!

Cornstarch & Baking Soda Ornaments: These turned out beautifully! Here's what we did:

Combine 1/2 c. cornstarch

               1 c. baking soda

                3/4 c. water 

Pour all ingredients into a medium saucepan on medium-low heat, stirring consistently. Stir until the mixture starts to thicken and eventually looks like mashed potatoes. 

Remove dough from saucepan and put it in a bowl and cover with a damp towel. Let cool for approximately 30 minutes, until dough is at a comfortable temperature to touch. Knead the dough thoroughly to get out any air bubbles. Roll out dough 1/4" thick.

We used rubber stamps to make impressions in the dough before we cut them. We used snowflake and other winter themed stamps from Stampin' Up! Then, we cut into shapes,. Remember to cut out a hole for hanging using a straw. 

Most instructions we found said to then bake them in a 200 F oven. However, since we have a dehydrator, I thought it might be better to let them dry more slowly at a lower temperature. We set it on 120 F and let it dry for 20-24 hours. I can't compare the results with ornaments baked in the oven, but I was very pleased with the way they came out.

Although I found the ornaments very pretty, I felt like they were lacking personality & pizzazz. So I got out my Stampin' Up! inks and a bag of cotton balls. After rubbing the cotton balls in the ink pad, I rubbed them in circles over the stamped design. We tried different looks such as, rubbing the entire ornament, rubbing the middle & the edges of the stars, and just rubbing the centers where the stamped image was. We liked the last look the best. The more you rub in circles, the darker the ink gets. I would rub the very center the darkest, then get lighter as I moved to the edges. This added so much depth to the ornaments. 

I then tied hemp twine to the ornaments, with a 1" strip of homespun fabric tied around the hemp twine. I love these! We will be using them for years to come.

 This is my favorite!

We also dehydrated orange slices for the tree. Adding hemp twine & homespun fabric for hanging. (I wish I had a photo of the finished ornaments.)

I antiqued and rusted jingle bells using the following instructions found here. I hung them with hemp twine & homespun fabric as well. Rather than ribbon as garland, we used burlap. I bought it in rolls from Michael's. We also hung our wooden ornaments and others that had a country look or held sentimental value to the kids. I loved this tree! It is my favorite tree in years! (We do a different theme each year!) It was beautiful, and we had fun together as a family creating the ornaments!

We also had fun making a display for our front porch. We cut small spruce trees from our yard, placed them in pails filled with sawdust and decorated them. It was very pretty and welcoming.

Merry Christmas & Happy Crafting!