Frugal Crafts & Homemade Gifts
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Stained Glass Christmas Ornaments

by Michelle Jones   

Here's a lovely idea for making some new Christmas ornaments using regular household items (so they're practically free!), but what's even better is that the entire family can participate.  It's one of those fun and inexpensive activities we like to call frugal family fun!  More...

Several years ago our children made these Christmas ornaments at school using foil and markers, they were just so beautiful and soon turned out to be one of my all time favorites.  

To make the ornaments, the students first cut a piece of stiff paper, like a manila folder, into the shape of an ornament. One of the more popular shapes is a round ball with a squared edge at the top and a point down at the bottom. You could make these ornaments any size you wish, but the ones our children made at school were about 6-inches long and 4-inches wide.  (They look great this size, but slightly smaller would be fine too.)

After creating the ornament shapes the children then drizzled random lines of glue along the ornament to create sections, like the black part of stained glass ornaments. After the glue dried completely, they were ready for the next step. 

The ornament shapes were then covered with a sheet of aluminum foil, shiny side up, making sure to cover both the front and back. (You could also fully decorate both sides of the ornament, but even just doing one side is very pretty.)

After the ornaments were covered with foil, they took different colored markers and 'painted' the sections of the ornaments to make them look like stained glass. The glue underneath the foil acts as a barrier from one color to another and can be outlined with a fine black marker, if desired. Each child's ornament came out unique, and they were all beautiful!

And finally, to prepare the ornaments for hanging on the tree they pierced a small hole through the top and ran a piece of red yarn or ribbon through them to make a loop.  (The loop can be tied in a small bow or a knot, whichever you prefer.)

These homemade Christmas ornaments could make great presents for grandparents too; original artwork from their grandchildren!  You could even make the ribbon a bit larger so the ornaments can be used as doorknob decorations during the holidays, or create other shapes for use throughout the entire year--like hearts, butterflies, flowers, etc...! 

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Copyright © 2005 by Michelle Jones, author of Frugal Family Recipes.  All rights reserved.