Homemade Christmas tree ornaments are one of the most fun and rewarding projects for the season! Most are easy to make, so kids can help out, and with the whole family involved, you can make a lot of them. They make lovely simple gifts for coworkers, classmates, and friends, or they can be accessories to a larger wrapped present. Year after year, as you unpack them, you’ll remember the fun time you had making them.
Here are 15 of my favorite super easy tutorials to get you started!
1. DIY Paper Candy Canes
Tutorial available via happy hooligans
This is a perfect kid-friendly craft. They get to color, cut, and roll to get these fantastical candy canes. If your kiddos are too young for one step of the process, you can create a young to old elf-like assembly line so that everyone gets to take part. These would look adorable hanging from a tree or on a piece of baker’s twine, as a garland across the mantel.
2. DIY Modern Paper Ornaments
Tutorial available via DesignSponge
Just in case your tree is already bowing over from all the ornaments, these modern paper ornaments would look fantastic hanging above a table from a chandelier (but they’d look great on the tree too!).
3. DIY Pipe Cleaner Christmas Tree
Tutorial available via Martha Stewart
Pipe cleaners rarely fail when it comes to making crafts, but this mini tree constructed of five pipe cleaner snowflakes is an exceptional use of them. You can either stop with the snowflakes and decorate your larger tree with them, or fasten them together to make a mini tree fit for any room in the house.
4. DIY Fabric Scrap Christmas Balls
Tutorial available via Jillian in Italy
Maybe it’s the glue and Styrofoam involved, but this is one nostalgia-inducing crafting project. Kids will love helping to make these! Plus, who doesn’t love a good excuse to use some of those beautiful fabric scraps sitting around—they don’t even have to look traditionally Christmas to work.
5. DIY Paper Bird Ornament
Printable template and tutorial available via Better Homes and Gardens
Use pages from an old book to create these elegant, lightweight paper birds.
6. DIY Ribbon Star Ornaments
Tutorial available via Martha Stewart
These celestial-inspired ornaments would look lovely hanging from the branches of your tree or from the ceiling.
7. DIY Cookie Cutter Ornaments
Tutorial available via Martha Stewart
What a great use of inexpensive cutters. You could make a batch of cookies using one of them, then gift them in a jar adorned by one of these colorful paper– or photo-backed ornaments.
8. DIY Paper Ball Ornaments
Tutorial via Sarah Nielsen
These look great; they’re so easy to make that you can create enough of them to decorate your entire tree in about an hour; kids can help; and they store nice and flat for use next year! What’s not to love?
9. DIY Origami Star Ornaments
Tutorial via Homemade Gifts Made Easy (photo via Ann Martin)
The easy-to-follow video that accompanies this tutorial makes learning how to fold origami stars a cinch. Use paper from old magazines or books, make a few snips here and there, and you’ll have ornaments that would look great on the tree or simply leaning on a mantel.
10. DIY Three-Dimensional Doily Ornaments
Printable template and tutorial via Martha Stewart
Three-dimensional doily ornaments are so delicate and traditional looking that they could almost be heirloom ornaments. Packed in pretty boxes, they’d certainly make awesome gifts.
11. DIY Yarn Ornaments
Tutorial via Cakies
Crafts that look pretty in their imperfection are the best ones for young crafters. Kiddos will love wrapping colorful yarns around wire to create a magical little trinket for the tree.
12. DIY Yarn Wrapped Star Ornaments
Tutorial available via Live Laugh Rowe
A more refined version of the yarn-wrapped ornament above—but just as easy to make—is this star ornament based on cardboard. You can use neutral colors as shown here or create from a brighter palette.
13. DIY Paper Ornaments
Template and tutorial available from the Etsy blog
Using the free downloadable template, you can easily customize these paper ornaments rooted in German tradition by making different sizes or using different embellishments. Fun!
14. DIY Teardrop Holiday Ornament
Tutorial available via A Little Hut
It’s as easy as paper, glue, and scissors to make these sweet teardrop-shaped ornaments. Make up a handful of them in a monochromatic palette that complements your existing ornament collection or use them to add splashes of color.
15. DIY Peppermint Ornament
Tutorial available via Martha Stewart
It probably doesn’t get more kid friendly than this edible peppermint candy ornament stuck together with icing and adorned with cinnamon candies. The smell alone is reason enough to make these. Yum!
