Homemade Christmas Ornaments

"Little Glittery Tree"

Submitted by Ceci of McKinney, TX

This small tree (10" tall) is very easy to make and you can recycle a few things you have around your house to make it.

Materials: Cereal box, little piece of cardboard, paint brush, masking tape, paper glue, hot glue, paper, tissue paper or craft paint, greenery/floral picks, cap from small containers or any cap that can be used as a stand. You can find a variety of glittery floral picks at the floral department of your local craft store when they start selling Christmas décor. 

1-Cut out the front (or back) of the cereal box and make a cone. Trim the bottom as straight as possible as seen in the picture.

2- Trace the bottom of the cone on some harder card board and cut around leaving a little edge as seen in the picture. Hot glue the cone to the circle and use masking tape to reinforce and secure it in place. Next, hot glue the cap to the cardboard circle to make a stand. I have 3 different ones in the picture I chose the plastic cup that came with my Chinese takeout for the sweet and sour sauce...Yummy!

3- Now you need to cover the whole thing with tissue paper (decoupage) brushing paper glue all over and don’t worry if is not perfect it will be mostly covered, overlap edges and don’t try to be perfect it won’t matter if is messy . If you don’t want to use tissue paper you can paint it using craft paint. It’s important that the color on the cone matches the color of your greenery/floral picks as it will show through. On the last picture you can see the cone covered with gold colored tissue paper.

4- Finally, start gluing your greenery/floral picks to the cone starting at the bottom and go all the way around before moving up to the next row. I’ve only added 3 rows to mine since my pieces were long and then I cut little bitty pieces to finish up the top. If you notice some gaps fill them with smaller pieces and if you need to, trim the tree to shape it. You can also use artificial rose petals, flowers, pistachio shells etc… 

You can decorate it like a mini tree but I like it just the way it turned out. A set of 3 of them in different sizes will look nice on a fire place mantel. 

2011 Homemade Christmas Ornaments Index