Pine cone ornaments

Christmas is a great time for projects, and almost anything can be adapted to display the holiday spirit! If you happen to be sick of seeing all of the plastic around year after year, or maybe if you are short on cash. Hey you might just be feeling really creative and are looking for a project you can do. A great choice is making pine cone Christmas tree ornaments. You can have a family evening of arts and crafts, or an afternoon crafts date with your girlfriends, heck even if you are alone its a great project. It costs hardly anything as well, since you most likely have all the things you need in your home already. And if not, they are cheap to buy.



What you will need to create your pine cone Christmas tree ornament:


- A pine cone, the number depends on how many ornaments you wish to make.


- A string of a sort, it can be sewing thread, fishing line, pretty ribbon, yarn, etc.


- Glue, either a hot glue gun or liquid crafts glue will do.


- Oil, tempera paints.


- Some paint brushes.


- Glitter, either in form of glitter pens, in paint or sprinkles.


- A plastic cup for water, this is for when you are painting. As well as a paper towel or two to clean the brushes.


- Old newspaper or other scrap to protect your work surface.


How to create your pine cone Christmas tree ornament:


- Before you start make sure you cover up your table, or other work surface with old news paper so it doesn't get ruined or dirty in case of any mishaps that are usually bound to happen during arts and crafts sessions.


- Now clean up your pine cone, get rid of any dirty or cob webs that might be on it. You can do this with a lightly damp paper towel.


- Once they are clean let them dry a few minutes. While they dry you could prepare your oil paints, water and brushes.


- After the pine cones are dried you are ready to decorate them. You can paint the whole pine cone in one color. You can go two tone, or one color per row. Really the options are endless, you just need to let your imagination run free. Golden, bronze and silver colors will make them look fancy, while bright colors will show off the more playful side.


- When done painting add some glitter. You should do this according to manufacturers instructions. And it depends on which type you get.


- After you have painted and glittered it up, once again let the pine cone dry completely.


- As for attaching the string so you can hang it, you can do this either buy tying it to the very tip of the pine cone, gluing it to the bottom. Or maybe you want it sideways in which case you can glue it in between the rows.


There are many variations of how to make these ornaments and with a little imagination and will they all come out looking spectacular.

Cookie cutter ornaments

Check out this article on how to make some lovely Christmas ornaments with cookie cutters! It really doesn't get much easier than this!

HeliumHow to make cookie cutter ornaments

DIY: Christmas Candy Hearts

While those candy hearts with messages on them have become so common around the Valentine's Day the truth is they aren't that great. We all love the cute idea but the cheap mass produced candies are faulty to the point that we might even feel bad giving them to someone! They don't taste that good, the messages are often faded, and the candies are mostly worn out or broken. So how can you preserve the adorable idea, personalize it and make the gifts last longer than a day? Easy, buy making these candy hearts for your darling out of polymer clay. They wont be edible but they will surely be cherished more than the originals were. You can even put your own short messages on them to surprise your loved one. And what is even better, now you don't have to wait for Valentines day to come around you can make a little twist and do these for your hunny on Christmas as well! 
What you will need to create your own clay candy hearts:
- Polymer clay in green and red, one block is about two dollars in your arts and crafts store, cheaper online.
- A straight edge knife or a craft blade.
- A few toothpicks.
- If you wish to make a mold of the hearts then you will need the Sculpey Mold Maker. If not then you can just shape your candy heart by hand.
- Red paint, tempera works fine.
- A super thin paint brush, or if you want just use the toothpick to draw on the messages.
- Baking tray and an oven, not a microwave!
- A list of short messages to put on the clay hearts.
- A packet of the actual candy hearts, for reference...and a snack.
How to create your own clay candy hearts:
- First make sure you have a nice clean surface to work on, you don't want hairs or other bits getting into your clay.
- If you are using a mold to create your hearts follow the instructions on the box for how to actually make the mold. Also make sure, when you are making it, that you press in the non letter side of the candy into it so you have a clean slate later on.
- In case you don't want to use a mold just form the hearts by hand, use the actual candy as reference. Its not hard and really you don't need a mold unless you are making a great number of them.
- After your hearts have been formed just let them sit a bit to harden, so they are not as mushy from your fingers.
- Alright now the messages, I personally do them with paint and a toothpick, freehand. Some people print them out then use rubbing alcohol to create transfers.
- Pick a short message and then carefully write it on the heart. The more unique and personal to the receiver of the hearts the better.
- Let the paint dry completely.
- Line the hearts up on the baking sheet and bake according to the manufacturers instructions.
The clay hearts are now complete. As for packaging, it all depends on you but here are a few examples... You can buy a pack of real stuff, carefully open it put the clay ones in among the real ones and re-seal the bag. It takes a little practice but its a nifty idea when you get it. You can also put them in small boxes from craft stores or in a Valentine's Day themed cellophane goodie bag.

Santa Hat Christmas ornaments

Of all the fun Christmas craft projects you can do for your home I find the small handmade ornaments to be my favorite. The little goodies are so unique and completely yours, they don’t look like the standard round shiny ornaments you can find at the store. These are tiny Santa’s, comical snowmen, my pet dog, the favorite Christmas cookie, my own one of a kind snowflake, etc. They are a great activity for an individual or a family of ten. And even better, you can store them away and collect more and more each year, even pass some on to your children one day.

While handmade Christmas ornaments are very versatile in the shapes, sizes and materials used for this occasion I have decided to create a small clay Santa hat ornament, if you are curious to find out how just read on!

What you will need to make your own clay Santa Hat Ornament:

- Red Polymer Clay. You can get a block of it for two bucks at Joann’s, Michael’s or any other crafts store. You will need less than one fourth of the block.

- White Polymer Clay. Same applies as for red.

- A few toothpicks.

- A few sheets of printer paper. You can use other stuff to protect your work surface just make sure none of the color will transfer onto your clay.

- Some festive string, not too thick.- A knife or a crafts razor.

- Some sort of a stubby screw driver or a different object of a similar shape. You will need this to put the hat on while fluffing the white of it.

How to make your own clay Santa Hat Ornament:

- First set up your work surface, protect it with paper or whatever else you might have decided to use and get your supplies ready.

- Break off a piece of the red Polymer clay, the amount depends on your desired ornament size so be vary of that when deciding how much you will use. Start shaping it into a sloppy cone.

- Once you have the approximate cone shape start working the top end out to shape it like the Santa’s hat (photo 1).

- Every once in a while you might need to stop working on your ornament and let the clay set a bit. This depends on a ton of factors like humidity and temperature, but the point is you don’t want the clay to become too soft and flimsy or it will be very fragile and a pain in the butt to work with!

- Take a small piece of white Polymer clay and start working it into a ball, this will be the fluffy tip of the hat. Flatten the ball and wrap it around the red tip of the hat.

- Repeat a few times until you get a bulb like shape on the end, once you have the shape apply one more layer of white (photo 2).

- Again, be wary of the clay becoming too soft. If it is OK to work with take a bigger piece of white Polymer clay and roll it out into a snake like shape.

- Apply it in circle around the base of the hat (photo 3) press down slightly so that it sticks to red but don’t smush it.

- Now that you have the basic shape of the Santa hat going on grab that screw driver and the toothpick.

- Use the screw driver handle as a head and place the hat on top of it. Now, and do this carefully not to knock it off, scratch up the white around the base with a toothpick (photo 4).

- When you are done it should look something like this: (photo 5).

- Now repeat the process on the ball of white, make sure you are extra careful because the tip is thin and you don’t want it all breaking off, (photo 6).

- Once again let the ornament set a bit. You might find this annoying but trust me it will help you as far as flimsiness and stability of it go.

- Take a toothpick and poke a hole at the top of the ornament, the top being where the hat folds. You will make the hole by slowly pushing the toothpick through the clay while spinning it. Have your finger on the other side where it should come out (photo 7), once you feel it poke your finger gently take it out and repeat the same from the other side. What this does is it ensures that you have a nice clean hole (photo 8).

- The pre-baked product will look something like this: (photo 9). You can smooth it out if it looks rough like mines.

Ornament Cake Balls

Christmas, along with being a time of joy and giving is also a time when we try and out do one another (whether we like to admit it or not) in the sweets we bake and the crafts we make. And combining the two with the seasonal touch will make for a perfect gift, centerpiece or even a tree decoration. This very special treat is an adaptation of super popular cake balls. We will be using the same principles only we will tweak the shapes a little!

Photo by: http://www.cakecentral.com

While this project is not completely suitable for children to make they can definitely help out quite a bit as long as there is an adult around to help out and supervise. Cake balls are very, very versatile so you will have a lot of options to choose from as far as flavors go!

Photo by: http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com

What you will need to create your treats:
- One package of cake mix along with the ingredients to make it (any flavor, or you can make it from scratch).
- One can of frosting, again any flavor you wish.
- A bag of white chocolate chips.
- Edible coloring pens.
- Food coloring.
- Decorating gel, as many tubes as you want in any colors.
- A pack of lolly-pop sticks.
- Wax paper.
- An assortment of sprinkles.

Photo by: http://www.cakecentral.com

How to make the treats:
- Bake the cake according to the instructions on the cake mix box.
- Once the cake has baked, let it cool off enough so you can handle it. Take a big plastic bowl and crumble your cake into it, then add the icing. Mix it all in good until you get a smushy weird mass.
- You should let the cake and icing mix chill for at least two hours before shaping the balls.
- Once your mixture has chilled shape the small bite size balls. A melon scoop helps if you want perfect shapes but is not necessary. You should freeze the balls at least six hours before dipping them, just make sure that they aren't frozen solid!
Alright now comes the decor part. You will want to work in small batches and quick.
What we will be creating is Christmas Ornaments.
- In a small bowl melt enough white chocolate chips for your batch of Christmas Ornament cake balls, add a couple of drops of your preferred food coloring until you get a color you are happy with. You might want to figure out your color scheme beforehand, this will be the base color of the ornaments.
- Using a toothpick or a fork dip the cake balls into the chocolate and then lay them down on wax paper covered plate. Repeat until all of them are finished.
- Let the balls sit so the chocolate can solidify. After the chocolate has set you can use the edible markers, the decorating gel, fondant and sprinkles to draw designs and decorate the ornaments.

Photo by: http://inspired-by-chocolate-and-cakes.com

Another thing you can do is melt the white chocolate chips once again and color them, then using a narrow tip squeeze bottle you can decorate the ornaments by drawing on them. If you wish you can also stick lolly-pop sticks into the cake balls.