Homemade Ornament Ideas

To make personalized ornaments, you'll need a package or two of clear glass ornaments and several bottles of acrylic paint. The metallic colors, especially gold and silver, work best. We also used a deep red, blue, and green with great success on our handmade ornaments, too.

The night before you're going to create your holiday masterpieces, take off the ornament tops and then pour a little rubbing alcohol inside of each. Swish it around, and dump it out. This cleans the interior of any dust or dirt so that you have a fresh surface to work with.

Turn the Christmas ornaments upside down to drain. The next morning, gather paints, the glass ornaments, and cover your work surface with newspapers to protect it.

This is a bit of a messy job. But the festive result is well worth the extra clean-up time. Here are a few homemade ornament ideas you can try at home.

Add Color Inside Each Ornament

Squirt about three teaspoons (three little squirts) of several different acrylic paints into each ornament. 

Keeping your thumb over the top hole, gently swirl the colors around until they're mixed the way you like them. Then place them gently back in the box, upside down, with fresh newspapers underneath. Allow to dry a couple of days before using or wrapping as your customized holiday gifts.

Finish by placing the tops back on and tie with a festive ribbon. Consider stringing beads on the hook for added sparkle. These are great gifts for teachers and grandparents.

Homemade Ornament Ideas if You Want to Get Really Festive

• Personalize it. You can write your name (or the name of the person you're giving it to) on the front along with the year in glitter glue or using an acrylic paint pen.

• Make it sparkle. Instead of putting paint in the glass ornament squirt in a little glue and then pour in glitter and swish it around. Then pour out the leftover and let dry. Don't use too much - you don't want the whole ball covered - you want to create a pattern. 

• We liked using white glitter. After it dries, stuff the ornament with confetti or beads and your child's class picture.
  

• Design it. You could also write the person's name on the ball with clear glue and then roll the ball in glitter. 

• Or, you could make a design on the ball - like a snowman - and roll the ball in white glitter. Or, you could outline a tree with the glue and turn it in green glitter. After it dries, glue on little colored beads.

Those are our homemade ornament ideas. But the possibilities are endless. Use your imagination to create memories of the season that best reflect your personality and style.