Young House Love

Home Decorating & DIY Tutorials

| By | | 289 Comments

38 Homemade Christmas Ornament Projects

It’s Wednesday the 2nd… so it’s time to share this season’s (completely unofficial) Pinterest Challenge (not sponsored by Pinterest or anyone else, just dreamed up by Katie to make us stop pinning and start doing).

Fall Challenge

I actually tackled ornaments (since the winter edition of our little Pinterest Challenge won’t be until January), which I mentioned last Wednesday when Katie, Ana, Erin and I issued our little get-off-our-bums-and-make-something challenge.

I know, I know – it’s not even Thanksgiving yet. I’m one of those one-holiday-at-a-time peeps too. But it was actually oddly satisfying to feel so “prepared” for the upcoming holiday season. And I’m kind of in love with all the happy little ornaments I squeezed out. I actually ended up making 38 DIY ornaments! Here are just a few of the things that inspired them (all found thanks to Pinterest, but originally from here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here):

Pinterest Inspiration1

As are the rules, I took inspiration (or Pintspiration, har-har) from the above projects and then I did my own spin. Which added up to those 38 aforementioned ornaments that I whipped up. My method? Good ol’ trial and error. I just played around and made stuff up as I went along. Here’s what I ended up with:

  • 12 faux ceramic animal ornaments (inspired by the A stuff above)
  • 18 colorful swirl glass bulb ornaments (inspired by the B stuff above)
  • 3 patterned ceramic ornaments (inspired by the C stuff above)
  • 4 faux antler ornaments (inspired by the D stuff above)
  • 1 skeleton key ornament (inspired by the E stuff above)

Here they are now:

Ornament Grid1

And here’s how I made each type:

Faux Ceramic Animal Ornaments

Pinterest Three Animals

  • Purchased a pack of small plastic zoo animals from Michael’s for $4 (with coupon)
Pinterst Animal Toob

  • Primed them all with white spray primer
Pinterest Animals Primed

  • Use small drill bit to start a hole to screw small ring hooks into the top of each one so they could be hung
Pinterest Animal Screwing H

  • Painted 4 of them white, 4 of them lime green, and 4 of them navy (w/ acrylic craft paint from Michael’s)
  • Added colorful string (the kind used for friendship bracelets from Michael’s) for hanging

Colorful Swirl Glass Bulb Ornaments

Pinerest Three Painted Bulb

  • Purchased three six packs of glass ornaments (in small and large sizes) from Michael’s for $9 total (with coupons)
  • Removed the ornament cap and poured a decent amount of 99 cent craft paint in one of three colors into the ornament (exact colors I used: “Limeade” by Apple Barrel, “Metallic Emerald Green” by Folk Art, and “Magenta” by Folk Art Shiny)
  • Slowly swirled the ornament around to spread the paint and create a nice “spun” effect (I aimed to cover 50% of the glass with paint for a not-too-much-and-not-too-little effect). Here’s a video to show you just how easy these babies really are:
  • Allowed each ornament to dry overnight
  • Reattached the ornament caps in the morning after the craft paint dried
  • Added colorful string (the same kind used for friendship bracelets from Michael’s) for hanging

Patterned Ceramic Ornaments

Pinterest Three Ceramics

  • Purchased three ceramic ornaments from Michael’s (for $5 total with coupons) along with three Sharpie markers in navy, magenta, and plum (also from Michael’s for another $5 with coupons)
Pinterest Ceramic Orns Befo

  • Drew magenta and plum chevrons on one ornament, hot pink continents on another (for a modern globe effect), and nested starbursts on the third ornament (in navy, plum, and magenta)
  • Switched out the stock red ribbon for colorful string (yup, the friendship bracelet stuff from Michael’s)
  • Oh and I’m planning to paint the gold cap of the globe ornament someday (white or orange or navy or pink… not sure yet)

Faux Antler Ornaments

Pinterest Antlers Alone

  • Purchased one square of Premo Sculpey clay in lime green from Michael’s for $2
  • Sculpted two small shield shapes and two larger ones
  • Used a needle to create two holes for hanging and a stick to create two indents where each stick antler would be glued
  • Baked according to the Sculpey directions to permanently harden them
Pinterest Sculpe Baked

  • Used crazy glue and sticks from the front yard to create faux antler trophy
  • Added colorful string for hanging (more of that friendship bracelet stuff from Michael’s)

Skeleton Key Ornament

Pinterest Key Alone

  • Grabbed rusty old skeleton key (a sweet gift from a friend)
Pinterest Key Before

  • Used spray primer and white craft paint leftover from faux ceramic animals to paint it white
  • Added the friendship bracelet string for hanging

As for where I’ll display the not-so-Clara-friendly ornaments (well, they’re all super friendly for looking, especially all the zoo animals – just not so friendly for touching when it comes to the glass and ceramic ones), I’ve always loved the idea of a half-height tree on a round pedestal table like this – so we might get a real tree for that (and plant it in the backyard when the holidays are over). But on to the money stuff – here’s the budget breakdown:

  • $4 for plastic zoo animals (from Michael’s)
  • $2 for ring hooks for animals (from Lowe’s)
  • $3 for spray primer for animals (from Lowe’s)
  • $3 for acrylic paint in navy, white, and lime (from Michael’s)
  • $2 for friendship bracelet string for hanging (from Michael’s)
  • $9 for 18 clear glass ornaments (from Michael’s)
  • $2 for magenta & teal acrylic paint (reused lime paint from animals)
  • $2 for Primo Sculpey clay for faux antlers (from Michael’s)
  • Total: $27 (so each of the 38 ornaments was 71 cents on average)

Oh and don’t forget to check in on Katie, Ana, and Erin to see what amaaaaazing projects they whipped up (they’ll be sharing theirs sometime today as well)!

Pinterest Challenge Peeps

And now here’s the part where we invite you to share all of the fun Pinterest Challenge projects that you guys have tackled in the last week (right along with us, well at least virtually with us). If you’ve already blogged about it, just:

  1. click on the blue “Add Your Link” button with the odd cartoon head at the bottom of this post (you might have to do some scrolling, depending how many projects are added)
  2. add a link to your specific blog post about your project in the url field (not your home page)
  3. where it says “name” write a descriptive name for your project (ex: “38 DIY Ornaments”) as opposed to your actual name
  4. we’d also love if you could quickly link back over to our project posts within your own (here’s Katie’s, Ana’s, Erin’s, and ours) – it’s also nice to link to your inspiration project on Pinterest as well as to directly link to the original project/site, just so they get some love too.

And if you’d rather just link over to your project in the comment section, feel free to do that – or even add a link to a free photo sharing site like Flickr with your pics if you don’t have a blog (remember to set the gallery to public so we can all see it). We can’t wait to see what you’ve been up to! Geeked out doesn’t even begin to describe it.

Update: You can check out all of our favorite holiday decor finds here – many of which are under $15! 

Comments

  1. Chelsea says

    Your ornaments have inspired me to make my own! This is the first year that I will have my own Christmas tree and I have zero ornaments. Hopefully I’ll be able to make some cute (and cheap!) homemade ones to start off my collection.

    For my Pinterest challenge I gave a couple of Ikea Rast dressers a facelift and now they’re great new nightstands! http://www.flickr.com/photos/69343824@N05/
    (sorry for the blurry pics, I took them with my phone)

    Reply

  3. Jesse B says

    Ok, thank you for hosting this fabulous challenge! And you guys just gave me the best idea on what to do with all my lil guys army men/figurines! We have so many hanging around, I’m totally going to copy and paint them for the lil tree in his room. Hopefully, that will be a few less army men lying around waiting for me to totally slip on. I cannot even count the amount of times that has happened. ;) Thanks again!!!

    Reply

  4. Tamsyn says

    These look amazing Sherry! I especially love the ones with the swirled paint, the colors are gorgeous!

    Thanks so much for hosting the challenge. It’s my favorite blog event ever!!

    Reply

  6. Aimee @ ItsOverflowing says

    I love your ornament ideas!!! I’m thinking my boys’ christmas tree will definitely be spun off of your plastic figurine idea (with links back to you for credit, of course! Thanks so much for the motivation to change my Table into the Kitchen Cart I totally had been dreaming of (ever since seeing it on Pinterest)!!! I’m so stoaked to have a link on your site after following you for practically forever!!!

    Aimee @ ItsOverflowing.com

    Reply

  8. cindy says

    I made sweet potato gnocchi…they came out a little heavy & gummy but it was a shot…I sauteed them with garlic and butter…I would def make them again.

    Reply

  10. Tanya says

    So fun! I actually created a Pinterest board that is named “Completed Pinterest Projects” to try and motivate me to do stuff!

    Reply

  13. Holly says

    I love your ornaments! Did you have any trouble with the acrylic paint not sticking to the glass for your swirled ornaments? I’m trying to make some with paint covering the entire inside, but I’m finding that as the paint dries, I end up with bare spots.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Hmm, didn’t have any issues with that! I wasn’t trying to cover the whole thing but all the places I swirled it were covered fully. Maybe try adding more paint! I used quite a bit so maybe that made for better (aka: thicker) coverage?

      xo,
      s

  15. Carly says

    Sherry and John,

    THANK YOU for issuing this challenge and making me get off my Pinterest-lazy behind. I’m just now beginning my foray (I’ve never seen that word typed out before… interesting) into home DIY crafts and such, and I think I may be addicted. :)

    I’ve stared at my creation for hours. Is this normal? Also- thanks to John for the “wood aging” techniques.. I used his tips and my downstairs neighbors couldn’t be more thrilled (…)!

    http://3girls-1blog.blogspot.com/2011/11/pinsession-addinterest.html

    Carly

    Reply

  16. Annette says

    About the tree and safety: At home, from the very first christmas that I was around, my dad would attach the tree to the ceiling.
    As the tree would stand in the same place every year, all it took was one screw with an eyelet (I’m sure, there’s a name for it, I just don’t know it) that he drove into our wooden ceiling and a thin wire attached to it.

    We’d wrap the wire around the top of the tree and in 31 years neither I nor my little sister have been able to topple over the tree. (Which is good, since we always used real candles on it)

    Reply

  17. Desirai says

    I totally wanted to participate in your pinterest challenge but didn’t read about it till Tuesday night. Guess I’ll have to wait for the next one.

    Everyone’s stuff looks amazing!

    Reply

  18. Kate says

    I’ve been waiting for a Pinterest account for about a month now. Sad, but also probably a good thing since I don’t have time to spend pinning things!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Head over to our Facebook page and ask for an instant invite from someone! People usually trade them over there so here’s hoping you get hooked up!

      xo,
      s

  19. Gini says

    How long does it take pinterest to invite? I requested this summer, and then again a few weeks ago, and still nothing. :-(. So sad! I hate missing out on the fun!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      No idea why some are taking so long, but if you go to our Facebook page and ask someone to share an instant invite they usually come through pretty quickly! You could be on by tonight! Good luck!

      xo,
      s

  22. Nicole says

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/87186563@N00/?saved=1

    There’s the link to my flickr.com photostream (one photo) of one of the projects I had pinned. It’s my son’s first halloween costume. And, here’s the link to the item I originally saw on Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/pin/194489868/

    I actually pinned an idea for some bat cutouts, which I made into a mobile (Bat-Mobile!), but I’m already really late with joining the brag-fest, and that photo is still not uploaded yet. :)

    Reply

  24. Anika says

    Okay, I realize I’m a few days late to the party, but I’ve had these huge empty glass ornaments for ages just waiting for me to come up with something to do with them, and when I saw this post I knew I wanted to try the paint inside the globes. It turned out beautifully, so I decided to try two paint colors instead of just one and I LOVE it! The paint swirls together and makes some beautiful and interesting designs on the glass. Just thought I should mention it in case anyone else is still playing around with the ornament idea. Thanks so much for the fun idea Sherry!! I’m excited to have a few more ornaments for my tree this year!

    Reply

  25. Jenny M says

    I have to say that ever since you all did your first Pintrest challenge I have been absolutely 100% addicted to that site. Checking it numerous times a day! I tell all my friends and I’m pulling the cutest ideas from there!

    Thanks for introducing me to Pintrest!!

    Reply

  27. Cynthia says

    I love looking at what everyone’s come up with! I don’t know how many would-be work hours I’ve lost by following this.

    And I’ve come to the conclusion that I will not feel complete without a Pinterest invite. Would it be possible for you to invite me? (Is this overstepping my blog-reader status?) Thank you for your consideration.

    Take care!

    Reply

  30. Pia says

    Please, please, please can you put the pinterest challange separately on your page with a direct link to it? I hate to scroll and I want to review all the nice things that everyone has done!

    Reply

  31. Megan M says

    I’m super late to the challenge, but I had to share…I figured you guys would appreciate a good stenciling project! I don’t have a blog so we’ll do this the old fashioned way.

    I pinned this on Pinterest after much deliberation on what to do with our dining room

    http://www.houzz.com/photos/140432/Willowgrove-Dining-Room-contemporary-dining-room-other-metros

    I never thought I’d paint a room black, but this ‘pin’ gave me just the right amount of courage and I did it!

    https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150355617681770&set=a.10150350243191770.340423.130488356769&type=3&theater

    (and yes, I was so proud of myself that I entered the Cutting Edge Stencils ‘customer submission’ contest.) :)

    Love y’alls blog, you’ve given my husband and I lots of inspiration to DIY with our new house!

    Reply

  32. Ashley says

    I love your ornaments!!!

    Here are some of my pinterest adventures:

    http://mistergandmecrafts.blogspot.com/2011/11/chevron-mug.html disaster!
    http://mistergandmecrafts.blogspot.com/2011/10/upcycling-picture-frames-with-maps.html success!
    http://mistergandmecrafts.blogspot.com/2011/10/home-is-where-your-heart-is.html success!
    http://mistergandmecrafts.blogspot.com/2011/09/sheep-embroidery.html so adorable!!!

    Thanks for putting this together :)

    http://mistergandmecrafts.blogspot.com/2011/10/homemade-butterfingers-and-playing-with.html yum!!!
    http://mistergandmecrafts.blogspot.com/2011/10/baby-ivy-and-some-of-her-handmade-swag.html

    Reply

  36. Arati says

    I really like the glass balls with the paint swirls – that could work really well for regular stuff like vases and candlesticks too, I’m thinking. Or even for glass plates – as long as it’s non-toxic paint.

    Does it work with glitter paint?

    Oh, and you might get me hooked on the white porcelain animals!

    Sadly, I’m still waiting for my Pinterest invite. Hopefully I’ll be able to contribute to the Winter challenge in January.

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      I bet it would work with glitter paint too! Good luck! As for a pinterest invite- you can always put a call out for an instant invite over on our facebook page! People trade them around pretty quickly over there!

      xo,
      s

  37. MarfMom says

    it’s ironic that we can’t pin this post :-( would you consider editing how the photos are put into the post so that it can be shared on pinterest, or adding a pin it share button?

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      We’ll have to add a pin it button! But you can definitely pin any image or post (like this one) using the bookmark widget (that’s how I pin everything!).

      xo,
      s

  38. Bre says

    Amazing write-up with some great Pinterst Ideas and a fun Challenge. Also this infographic about Pinterest just came through on my twitter feed and thought it might be something you and your readers would enjoy. It talks about how local businesses can use Pinterest to market their products.

    http://www.linchpinseo.com/infographic-pinterest

    Thanks again for the Guide

    Reply

Stuff We Love

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *