Have Fun Making Christmas Tree Decorations

The Christmas season can quickly zap a budget when youre shopping for gifts, food, wrapping paper, and chauffeuring your kids to their Christmas pageants and parties. One place that you can really save some money and let your personality and creativity shine is when trimming your tree. Why not make your own decorations? It can be a fun activity for the whole family to get involved in, and it can be done very affordably.

For instance, you can decorate colored glass balls you already have by using adhesive spray and glitter, or get your glue gun out and glue on some special sequins or jewels you found at the crafts store. Yarn, ribbon, raffia, stickers and even old buttons can be used as well. If you have old bits of lace, velvet or other favorite fabric, try trimming them into a special shape, such as a star or a heart, and affix them to the glass ornament.

We all receive beautiful greeting cards in the mail each Christmas. Why not use some of those favorite ones from the year before and decorate this seasons tree? You can use the entire card if you like, or you can simply clip out the pictures or scenes on the front that are your favorite and use them to make an ornament. You could also use these to decoupage a glass ornament.

Small childrens toys work great as ornaments as well. Small cars, dolls, farm animals, blocks, beads, and even puzzle pieces can be creatively worked into a theme for your tree. Look around your house and see what old toys you can find and incorporate them into your scheme. You could even work in some larger sized toys to decorate around the base of your tree.

You could even bake ornaments for your tree. If youre a baker at heart and your family and friends love your treats, a cookie tree would be loved by all. Gingerbread boys and girls would be lovely, but you can place a small hole in the top of any cookie you bake and hang from the tree using a pretty ribbon. Embellish your cookies with some pretty colored sugar or icing, or simply make up some dough that you can bake and then paint and decorate later.

Children young and old can get involved in the ornament making fun. Get out those crayons, paints, colored construction paper, and glue and put them to work! You could incorporate your favorite Christmas wrap and ribbon as well. Have children date each ornament they make, so youll all be able to enjoy it for years after. You might have so much fun doing this that you might want to have an annual Christmas tree ornament making day each holiday season before its time to decorate your tree.

And dont be afraid to use things that are just lying around your house that youd probably otherwise toss or leave in the bottom of the junk drawer. Old earrings and jewelry, feathers, felt, colorful pencil erasers, canceled stamps, and fish aquarium marbles and rocks can all find new life as part of your decorated or homemade ornaments.

Youre only limited by your own creativity, so toss around some ideas with your family members and get to work!

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