These simple festive ornaments are an easy and fun activity for every age, and create stylish and effective decorations for your tree or home décor. Not only do they make it easy for children to create something impressive that looks almost professional, but they are also kiddie-proof and won’t break easily if knocked from their spot. Meredith Huston is a certified elementary school teacher and founder of Turquoise Boutique Studio, a creative arts company in Dubai offering DIY experiences, tutorials and DIY Kits. She shares her step-by-step for making these cute crafts with your kids this Christmas…
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SUPPLIES: The key ingredient here is polymer clay in whatever colours you prefer. Polymer clay is safe and easy for kids to handle, and is both affordable and readily available at crafts stores or online. You’ll also need: Rolling pin and board; Cookie cutters in your desired shapes; Straw and/ or toothpick; String or ribbon; Scissors (to cut the ribbon); Cookie baking sheet.
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STEP 1: First, break off chunks of the different colours of polymer clay and roll them into balls.
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STEP 2: Next, use the palm of your hands to roll the balls out into a long, thin log shape. Each log should be the same length and approximately 30cm width (although any width is fine, just make sure they are all the same).
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STEP 3: Twist two logs of different coloured clay together, until it starts to look like that twisted marshmallow candy. If you wish you can twist any number of coloured logs together into one; just make sure that all of the colours are visible from the outside.
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STEP 4: To get the marbled effect, clump and rub the logs together. This is a stress-relieving kneading process that’s great for younger children’s fine motor skills.
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STEP 5: Then use the palm of your hand to smush the different colours of log together even more so that they form a colourful two-tone ball.
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STEP 6: Now, repeat the process, rolling this blended ball out again into another, very long, two-tone log using your hands.
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STEP 7: Bend the long, blended-colour clay log in half and twist it around itself.
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STEP 8: Squeeze and knead the blended log into a ball. However you do it, these ornaments will look effective – just make sure to stop your child from blending the colours together entirely, otherwise you’ll lose the marbled, tie-dye effect.
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STEP 9: Now use a rolling pin to roll out the smushed ball into a flatter piece of marble-effect clay. There’s no particular rule to how thick it should be (around 0.5- 1cm is a good guide), but try to make it as uniform as possible.
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STEP 10: Here’s when you can start using your variety of cookie cutters to carve out ornament shapes.
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STEP 11: Now make a hole in the top of each shape using either a straw, or a toothpick if you have some very small shapes. Make sure the hole runs all the way through the clay.
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STEP 12: Now pop the shapes onto the cookie sheet and bake in the oven at 130 degrees Celsius for about 14 minutes.
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STEP 13: Once cooled and hard, thread a cut piece of ribbon from the back side and pull the tails through the loop.
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STEP 14: Tie an overhand knot on the top so that you’ll be able to hang your hardened ornament.
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STEP 15. And there you have it – pretty, creative Christmas ornaments that are ready to adorn your tree! For more like this see http://turquoiseboutiquestudio.com/.
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