Magic Crystal Ornaments

These ornaments grow as if by magic!!
(as seen on Ordinary Life Magic)

You will need:

Pipe Cleaners
Glass Jars
Borax

(Borax is a natural cleaner....you can find it at most grocery stores, Wal-Mart, etc.)

To start, bend your pipe cleaners into shapes that will fit into the mouths of your glass jars (with a tiny bit of room to spare, as the crystals will slightly increase the size of the ornaments.) Bend a loop of pipe cleaner at the top, to hang from the tree.

Use a small piece of pipe cleaner as a "hook" for dangling the ornament over the size of the jar. (This can be removed later.)

On the stovetop, heat some water....for each glass jar you have, you will need 1 cup water and 3 Tbsp. Borax.

Just heat the water until it is pleasantly warm. Stir in your Borax til dissolved.

Place your jar somewhere nice, where you can watch the "magic" happen. Then hang your pipe cleaner shape -- whatever shape you have made --

(which may be a little crazy if you are 5 years old).....hang that inside the jar.

Nothing will happen for the first hour or so. Distract your concerned little crystal artists. A couple of hours later, when you peek in at your ornaments...magic crystals will have begun to grow! Over the course of 24 hours, your ornaments will be nicely covered with beautiful "snow" crystals. Remove the ornaments after about 24 hours -- they will feel dry to the touch almost immediately. Hang them on the tree, in a window, or somewhere they can sparkle!

Cinnamon Dough for Ornaments

Cinnamon dough smells heavenly! It makes a great, air-or-oven-drying dough for ornaments, figurines, whatever you like.

You'll need:

1 cup cinnamon
1 cup applesauce
2 Tbsp. white school glue

(Since this requires about 3 containers of cinnamon, get the cheapest you can find.)

Start by mixing your ingredients in a bowl:

This makes a nice dough, just a bit wetter than Play-Doh. Roll it out and cut shapes from cookie cutters. Thicker is better; we found just under half-inch to make for great, substantial ornaments that won't snap too easily. (If they are too thin, they will become brittle when fully dry.)

Use a straw to make a hole in the top of each shape, if you plan to use them as ornaments.

Let air dry for a couple of days, or bake in your oven at 250 degrees for about an hour (keep an eye on them; pointy edges, on such shapes as stars, will cook quickly). Bake just until dry to touch.

When your ornaments are dry, paint them with any acrylic paints.

If you finish a few and get distracted, you can always just paint your own hand, grinning at how proud you are of yourself.

Aren't you clever. ;)

Let them dry for a couple of hours. You can varnish them with any craft varnish. I had some gold glitter glue on hand, so I thinned that out and we just gave them a top coat with that; it acts like a sealant and added SPARKLE!

When they're fully dry, thread some pretty ribbon or embroidery thread through the hole, and you have nice little, delicious-smelling ornaments to give anyone who comes your way.

Papier Mache Christmas Forest

We found these papier mache cones at Michael's for $1.29 - $1.49 each; painted them with acrylics we had lying around; and affixed some decorations. They flank our wooden Advent calendar. You can find so many papier mache shapes at Michael's, you could probably build your own North Pole! But don't get too crazy, now. It's cookie-eatin' time.

Hope everyone is enjoying the season!

Felt Wreath Ornaments

Each year, Nora and I (and now Soren too) try to work on a craft to give as gifts to friends & family.  Last year, Nora threw her little heart & soul into papier mache ornaments.  This year, we're making felt wreaths (sorry if this is a spoiler to any family members!  Consider it...a sneak peek!).

This is an easy and pleasantly absorbing craft that I found on the terrific blog maya*made. 

You need:

-- various colors of felt
-- buttons in different colors & sizes
-- 3 1/2 " embroidery hoops
-- glue
-- ribbon or embroidery thread for hanging
-- pinking shears

Using your pinking shears, cut diamonds from the felt long enough to fold over your embroidery hoop, points-out. Glue the tips together. Keep gluing diamonds along your hoop until you have it as covered as you like.

When the glue has dried, let your child decorate the hoop with buttons. Nora liked putting all her buttons along the tips. In the maya*made design, she placed the buttons along the inside of the hoop. It's interesting how people have different artistic instincts! I let Nora arrange them however she pleased, because this is "her" gift.

--

Soren arranged a few buttons too, but then lost interest...so he did have *some* input into the family craft. We call him the Director of Morale.

Salt Dough Ornaments

The other night, we made salt dough ornaments.  It's a rustic little craft that kids can do much of themselves, and since we had water, salt, flour, and food coloring around the house already, we didn't have to venture out into the cold (and Nora, as you can see, could happily remain in her pajamas as she had most of the day!).  I've posted the simple recipe below.  It can easily be halved if you are running out of salt (like we were).  A half-batch made plenty of ornaments to decorate Nora's little Christmas tree. 

The coarser the salt you use, the more it will show up in the dough.  Add the food coloring to the water before mixing it into the dry ingredients.  Also, add your water just a little at a time, because I found that our mixture got too wet very quickly, and I had to add more flour.

Roll 'em out, give your kids some cookie cutters, and maybe a few doo-dads (buttons, craft pasta, etc.) to stick into the dough.  Even my 21-month-old was able to enjoy this!  He became very quiet and focused on squishing the buttons into the dough, but I cannot guarantee such an outcome for all 21-month-olds (or even my own on a different day!).  :)

Please scroll down for the recipe......

Salt Dough Recipe

As promised.....pictures & more winter crafts coming tonight.

1 cup flour
1 cup salt
about 2 cups water  (add a little at a time)

Combine your flour & salt well in a bowl. Gradually add water until you have a not-too-wet doughlike substance. Roll out as you would cookies, cut into shapes, and let air dry or bake at 200 degrees for a couple hours til dry (keeping an eye on them -- thin edges may begin to brown before other shapes).

You can add food coloring or glitter to the water to jazz 'em up....

Push in sequins or buttons or colored craft pasta...

Remember to make a hole in the top of the ornament with a toothpick, so you can string up your ornaments!