Add Personality To Your Tree With Homemade Christmas Ornaments

Vintage Postcard Ornament

Cut circles from inexpensive vintage postcards for easy, stylish ornaments. Search by theme, such as winter sports or holiday cooking, on Etsy or Ebay. (If you have a vintage card you don't want to cut, scan a color copy and hang the copy instead.)

Bias-Tape Stars

These intricate ornaments, a popular Christmas tradition in Scandinavia and Germany, spring from just four 1-foot-long strips of bias tape or folded, pressed fabric scraps. See how to make them.

3D Cardboard Ornaments

Even young kids can slot painted cardboard shapes in endless combos to make ornaments. See how to make these and other colorful, affordable paper projects.

Easy-Fill Ornaments

Nestle special "ingredients" inside ball ornaments for thoughtful, budget-friendly party favors or decorations. You can use wintry natural materials like we did, or let your imagination fly.

What you'll need
Plastic ball ornaments
Artificial snow
Pinecones
Pine tree clippings
Feathers
Ribbon

Instructions
Place items inside one ornament half. (Leave them loose, or secure with a dot of hot glue.) Top with the other half, string with ribbon, and presto, you're done!

Painted-Scene Ornament

Use white and red acrylic paints to create this snowy scene. Paint the bottom with two coats of white paint; let dry after each. Then add trees in different sizes. After they've dried, dab on red acrylic paint to look like cardinals.

Paper-Strip Ornament

Stuff a clear ornament with strips of paper from old books or sheet music for holiday decor that also makes a great gift for book- or music-lovers.

Glittery Music

Attach a favorite Christmas carol to cardstock and cover the edges with glitter for an easy, meaningful ornament.

Add Bling

Are you a scrapbooker or crafter? Go through your supplies for embellishments like this little snowflake. Hot-glue to glass ornaments.

Stamp It

Holiday stamps—vintage or current—look pretty inside clear glass ornaments.

Embroidered Style

Embroider a snowflake onto bright color linen or cotton for a mini ornament (they make great gifts, too!). Trace a design on cloth and embroider, then place in a miniature embroidery hoop, using hot glue to seal the edges.

Rope Accents

Place slivers of decorative paper in a clear ornament, then glue on strands of jute or another string to the top half.

Scrapbook Swirls

Turn leftover scrapbooking paper (or even brown grocery bags) into rosette ornaments. Cut long paper rectangles (ours are 1-inch-wide by 6 inches long) and glue ends together. Punch two circles out of cardstock and hot-glue the cardstock ends to one circle; let dry and glue the second circle to the other side. Use adhesive letters to add a holiday message.

Tissue Rreasures

Cover an ornament with tiny tissue paper shapes for a pretty geometric look. Cut solid or patterned tissue paper into small squares. Coat a white matte-finish ornament with decoupage glue, add tissue paper pieces, and coat with another layer of decoupage. Hang to dry.

Ribbon Candy

Make pretty candy-like ornaments from paper scraps and beads. Thread a needle with embroidery floss and knot one end. Use clear acrylic beads and one-inch-wide paper strips to create the candy shape; place two beads between each bend of the paper strip. Secure the top bead by running the floss through it twice, and make a loop for hanging.

Glitter Balls

Glitter adds a special touch to any plain ornament. Try mixing two colors, such as turquoise and green, matching one of the colors to the ornament. A bow in coordinating colors finishes the festive look.

Cookie Ornaments

Create a cookie-theme Christmas tree by making ornaments from cookie cutters, miniature rolling pins, bundles of cinnamon sticks and gingerbread men. Clear balls covered in twine and accented with bells add texture and shape to the tree.

Holiday Message

Sparkly stick-on letters spell out Christmas tidings.

Reuse Game Pieces

Do you have games at home that no one plays anymore? Use cards, tiles and other pieces to make garlands, spell holiday words or fill plastic ornaments.