Paper Ornaments 2--Paper Ball Ornament

For the second ornament this week, I decided to share with you one of my favorite paper ornaments--the paper ball ornament. This is so easy to do and once again, uses your favorite paper scraps.

Ornament #2--The Paper Ball Ornament

Materials
Paper strips of 1/2 inch width
Hole punch or awl
Two brads to fit the size of the hole you punch
Piece of embroidery thread or fishing line for the hanging loop.

You will need 12 to 15 strips of paper that are 4 to 4.5 inches in length.

Preparing the Ornament

• Stack all of your pieces on top of each other, right side up.
• Punch the entire stack of strips with two holes, 1/8 to 1/4 inch from the top AND bottom.
• Place the one brad through the entire stack at the bottom hole.
• Place the other brad through the entire stack at the top hole.
• Tie a loop around one of the brads at this point.

This is your finished ornament as you put it in the Advent Calendar. You should be able to place many of these to fill up your bag.

Assembling the Ornament

• Carefully, start separating each layer of the ornament from top to bottom. Because each of the ends are secure, the ornament should start taking a rounded shape.
• Continue separating the layers until all layers are separated.
• Start shaping the ball so that it has an even shape. You can use fewer or more layers depending on how full you want the ball to be. I prefer to use 12 layers and have some space showing between the different segments/sections of the ball.

Once again, the beauty of this ornament is that you can use a variety of paper and paper scraps to coordinate your holiday tree. Also, these make great gift tags if you tie them to the bow of your present. You can write the name of the recipient on the back of the flat ornament and allow the recipient to make their own ornament for their tree. These are fun in larger sizes hanging from the ceiling as party favors.

Paper Ornaments 1--Onion Dome Paper Ornament

This week, I was asked to submit some ideas for paper ornaments for our Advent Calendar. I will be doing a series of five different ornaments based using paper and will be split into three separate entries. Each of my ornaments require the recipient to interact with the ornament to "bring it to life" before placing it on the holiday tree. There are several benefits to these ornaments--one, they are based on paper scraps that everyone has in their craft room (or this gives you an excuse to go out and by some beautiful new papers that you want to have in your stash) and two, you can make many versions and stuff your Advent Calendar bag full of these lovely surprises.

Ornament #1--The Onion Dome Paper Ornament

Materials
Paper strips of 1/2 inch width
Hole punch or awl
Two brads to fit the size of the hole you punch
Piece of embroidery thread or fishing line for the hanging loop.

You will need five strips of paper--two that are 4 inches in length, two that are 3 1/2 inches in length and one that is 3 inches in length (all strips are 1/2 inch in width).

Preparing the Ornament

• Take one of the longest pieces, right side down.
• Take one of the middle pieces, and place on top of the longest piece, right side down.
• Take the short piece, and place on top of the middle piece, right side down.
• Take the remaining middle piece and place on the small piece, right side up.
• Take the remaining long piece and place on the middle piece, right side up.
• Align all of the pieces by the bottom edge and punch a hole 1/8 to 1/4 inch from the bottom.
• Re-align all of the pieces by the top edge and punch a hole 1/8 to 1/4 inch from the top. Put brad through this hole. Tie a loop of thread or fishing line around this brad.
• Place the remaining brad in any single hole of the ornament.

This is your finished ornament as you put it in the Advent Calendar. You should be able to place many of these to fill up your bag.

Assembling the Ornament
When your recipient opens up the bag, there will be a flat ornament. To build the ornament, take out the brad from the single hole of the ornament (do not remove the brad from the hole with the loop).

Align all of the holes from the loose ends of the ornament (this will give it the onion dome shape) and place the brad through all of the holes of the paper strips.


For this ornament, you will need strips of 1/2 inch in width (please keep in mind that these dimensions are solely based on the 4 inch by 4 1/2 inch Advent Calendar bags. These can be made in any dimensions and look beautiful in larger sizes).

The beauty of this ornament is that you can use a variety of different papers. I used patterned paper with white backing for illustrative purposes but you can use any number of double sided papers, or reflective papers/card stock, etc.