Idea Thread - Ornaments crafted by child

[RollerCoasterMama]

I started what I hope will be a tradition last winter after seeing a fun blog where the mother had transfered her children's drawings to fabric and embroidered them and made tree ornaments, quilts, pillows, etc out of them. I wasn't quite so fancy, but thought it would be fun to do a series of ornaments made with my son's artwork each year. One for each grandparent and great-grandparent, one for us and one for him one day as a wedding present or something like that.

So, last year he was just a few days shy of one year old at Christmas. Not exactly drawing something I could embroider!! We dipped one hand in red and one hand in green paint and basically used him as a human stamp. :P Once his painting had dried, I wrote his name and the year, scanned it into the computer and shrunk it way down. I printed it on iron-on transfer paper and ironed the tiny painting onto white fabric. I used a fun holiday print for the back side, and basically made little ornament sized pillows with ribbon loops. Sadly, no one really knew what they were until I explained, but I'm still hoping that we can keep up the tradition. The less destructable the ornament, the better!!!

We have no plans this year, and he's not quite two yrs old yet, so his artwork still isn't really recognizable. I'm not sure what we'll do this year. Hence this post! I'm always inspired by mamas here. So I thought I'd share my idea, and see what other ones pop up! I would still like to use some art that he participates in this year. Maybe a scanned in finger-painting as a fabric picture frame? I don't know yet!!

[NoliMum]

I think this is a cool idea. We have some ornaments that have children's artwork on them from some sort of children's charity, and they are really sweet.

You could go to a craft store and get little wooden circles (about 2" diameter) and let him paint a bunch of those, and then drill smalls holes to string some ribbon through for hanging. I was thinking of doing this with my toddler. Give him one color at a time, let it dry, then let him paint again with another color so they don't get all muddied together. Or use markers or crayons. You could also paint some glue on them and give him little pieces of tissue to stick on there so it's a collage.

[SuzyLee]

We are kind of doing this. Last year he was 3 months and I did footprints w/paint, on white paper, then hot glued green pipe cleaner around the edge. I think with a 2YO you might be able to do that dough that you bake. You roll out the dough, let him cut it with xmas cookie cutters, optionally he can stick little sequins and such in the dough, punch a hole, and bake them. Then string a ribbon through the hole.

[adoremybabe]

Last year with both kiddos we made hand prints and one foot print each. Their hands were wings and their feet were the bodies of angels. I cut out a little head shot of each kid and then used pipe cleaner for the halos. They turned out really cute.

[NiteNicole]

My daughter is three. We just made cinnamon and applesauce ornaments this week. I'm planning to let her paint and finger paint them all, then we're going to add jingle bells. Maybe next year I'll be able to let her glue sparkles on them. This year, not so much.

http://www.mccormick.com/Recipes/Oth...Ornaments.aspx

We're also going to do these handprint ornaments (not my blog):

http://mycraftymama.blogspot.com/200...ornaments.html

We might do some of these in Christmas colors:

http://www.apples4theteacher.com/hol...nt-wreath.html

I am so excited that she's old enough to help do some simple sweet crafty things. I hope she stays interested!

[MrsAprilMay]

You could make salt dough ornaments. One year when I was working in a toddler room I made them, let the kids paint them and then put a tiny picture of the child on their ornament. Like the index or proof sheet you get when you have pictures printed.

[RollerCoasterMama]

Thanks for the ideas everyone! I might do the salt-dough ornaments with a handprint -- although his hand's getting pretty big already and he's not even 2 yet!! We'll see.

I also thought I might do felt sugar cookies shaped like Christmas trees...it's not really his art-work, but highly inspired by him since we've been doing so much felt food since this summer.

Maybe I'll do both! One with his "art" and one with mine.

[Thursday Girl]

if you do salt dough make sure to finish them in a clear paint. Ours absorbed moisture and we ended up throwing a lot of them away after three years.

also if you do a brown handprint you can turn it into a reindeer. turn it upside down. the thumb is the head, add a face and antlers.

[wombatclay]

We've done the "angel" with the footprint body and handprint wings and we'ce also made reindeer where the nose/face is a clothespin and the antlers are hand prints (in brown paint). Oh, and if you're up for a lot of cutting, have your little one make dozens upon dozens of green handprints... you cut them out and glue them (point fingers in the same direction so the fingers of one overlap the palm of the print before it) to a circle of cardboard. The final result is a "wreath" where the handprints replace the evergreens. It sounds funky but it actually looks pretty neat. Red and white handprints and a curved piece of cardboard will give you a candycane look.

Oh yeah, and a footprint in brown for the trunk and handprints in green for the branches and you've got a holiday tree (do this as a "poster" of cut out and assemble... either looks neat!)

For individual ornaments we've also had the girls make a handprint and then used that as a template... the girls added crayon shavings to a wax paper sandwich, we melted the whole thing together, and then cut out handprints using the template. If you hang them in front of the holiday lights they glow with all different "stained glass" colors. And if you're sending these to relatives who live far away they fit in a regular holiday card envelope and don't weigh much! (we've actually used this as a Thanksgiving decoration as well, hanging dozens of these stained glass handprints off a branch that we then use as a centerpiece)

We plan on doing the "fingerprint snowmen" ornaments this year.