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I am so incredibly in love with Christmas cookies. There’s something that’s just so cheerful about cookies cut out into fun, winter or Christmas shapes and decorated with little drips and dots of icing. Maybe it’s because making cookies has been such a personal part of my Christmas experience but I think that I’m not the only one who totally digs sweet, sweet cutie cookies this time of year.
I remember one year I saw a tree with real cookies on it. My first thought was how cute it was and my next thought was concern with pets eating them. Because in my world kitties love sugar, even though it is terrible for them and dogs will not be able to turn down a Christmas tree sweets buffet.
Full disclosure… I’m actually typing up this post on January 11, 2016 and I’m waaay beyond the Christmas spirit. I still haven’t managed to get my Christmas trees down for one good reason… Every year I snap up tons of clearance Christmas craft items to DIY up for the next season. But when I moved down to South Texas I found this box full of tons and tons and tons of Christmas ornaments AFTER I had already made all of my posts for 2015. Ugh. What a waste of money (even at clearance prices) and Christmas crafty resources.
Are you ready to get your Christmas spirit on? Let’s get to it, my friends.
For this project you will need:
- Flat ceramic blank ornaments (ready to decorate)
- Folk Art acrylic paint, yellow ochre, gilded oak, teddy bear tan
- Soft bristled brush
- Tulip Dimensional paint in white
- Ribbon in white, green or metallic string
So these are my blank ornaments purchased at 80% off. Score! Now I bought a ton of brown and tan paints until I came up with the color combination I liked best. I wanted the more done outer edges and the less baked looking middle. The colors I used were Folk Art brand craft acrylic in yellow ochre, gilded oak and teddy bear tan.
My ornaments came with hangers already attached. These are going to get in the way so remove them if you have them.
Start each ornament with a coat of yellow ochre covering the front, back and sides fully.
While the first coat is still wet brush gilded oak onto the edges so that each “cookie” looks actually baked, you know how the edges always brown up a bit more than we want them to?
Again, while working with wet paint brush the teddy bear tan only in the middle areas of the cookies. This will include down the center of the spokes like on this snowflake. Now let the cookies dry completely. FYI – your hands are going to get crazy yellow BUT luckily craft acrylic washes off no problem-o!
As the cookies dry the paint will seep into the ceramic. Any worries of brush strokes, unless super prominent as you work, will fade away as the paint sinks in giving each cookie a nice, matte look.
Use Tulip Slick paint or your fave puffy paint to “ice” each cookie.
There are no rules so decorate each as you please, or give to the littles to decorate into ornaments you can cherish for years!
I loved being able to make each cookie different and totally had fun with it with squiggles…
…as well as more traditional designs.
A short length of ribbon that matches your tree, or a pretty silver or gold string, will perfectly complement your Christmas design.
Hanging on my white tree these guys are just the sweetest things and perfect for my sweet treats Christmas theme this year (unless that changes over the next, erm, 10 months, which I suppose is totally possible as I am crazy fickle!)
Love these! Where did you buy the ornaments at?
You can get them at Hobby Lobby! They are out of stock online but if you have a store you can run to they’re only $0.80 for a pair. You can also find similar ornaments at Michael’s. If you can’t find ceramic, you can also use unfinished wood ornaments. Good luck!