25 DIY Christmas Ornaments for Kids

If you’re looking to make your own homemade Christmas tree decorations, there are tons of different ways you can go! To give you a good selection, we’ve picked 25 of our favorite DIY ornaments. You could make one for every day of December leading up to Christmas!

I love DIY Christmas ornaments because they add a ton of personalization to the tree, and a lot of the ones below make for great keepsakes too. And, of course, these are the perfect homemade gift ideas for Christmas too!

Easy DIY Christmas Ornaments for Kids & Toddlers

These DIY Christmas Ornaments are perfect for kids as they’re easy to make, but they still look amazing on the tree. So, whether you’re looking for classroom craft project ideas or you want to have a family Christmas craft session, the ideas below are perfect.

1. Toilet Roll Reindeer

Wow. These reindeer have some attitude! This project is just the perfect example of a great ornament craft to do with the kids. With the help of their creativity, your reindeer will be rolling in no time!

PS – Check out our other toilet roll crafts if you enjoy stuff like this! There are so many different ways to utilize toilet paper rolls in crafting.

Items Needed:

• Toilet roll tubes
• Brown wallpaper samples (use sandpaper or brown paint)
• Brown pipe cleaners
• Red artificial berries or red pom-poms, buttons, etc.
• Googly eyes
• Glue

Make This Project

2. Simple Filled Ornaments

Candy sprinkles inside ornaments? Pretty wild idea but it works! You can easily create a whole lot of Christmas ball ornament variation using this. The fun fact is it’s so simple to do you can create dozens with no sweat, and the kids can help too!

Items Needed:

• Glass ball ornament
• Acrylic paint
• Candy sprinkles
• Varnish
• Yarn, twine, feathers, fake snow, pine needles

Make This Project

3. Pom-Pom DIY Christmas Tree Ornament

I love how these little pom-pom trees look and this craft is super easy for kids to take part in. Plus, you can probably find most of the materials needed at the dollar store!

Items Needed:

• Pom Pom
• Craft stick
• Cardboard piece
• Construction paper
• Red ribbon
• Acrylic paint (gold)
• Gem stickers | buttons | sequin
• Glue

Make This Project

4. Paper Snowflakes

Paper snowflakes are an absolute classic, must-do Christmas craft for kids. It’s so cool cutting the paper and seeing the different, unique designs that are created. Plus, these are super easy to make and you just need scissors and some paper!

Items Needed:

• Paper
• Scissors

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5. Drip Paint Ornaments

You’ll need some plain glass ball ornaments for this craft so it’s not completely DIY, but it’s still really awesome. The kids will love it. You can get all sorts of different colors and themes going and the end result is fantastic.

Items Needed:

• Plastic cups
• Paper towels
• Gloves
• Plastic drop cloth
• Glass ball ornaments
• Crafts paint

Make This Project

6. Handprint Ornaments

These handprint ornaments made from salt dough are super cute and creative. They make for a great keepsake too! You can either make all four characters or let the kids pick their favorite and go from there.

Items Needed:

• Quite a few things needed for this craft – click the link below for the full list + tutorial!

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7. Scrabble Tile Ornament

This ornament idea is so clever! The crafter suggests spelling out “Let it snow” with your tiles, but really, you could come up with anything you want! Comment your ideas below 🙂

Items Needed:

• Scrabble tiles that spell “let it snow”
• Snow texture paint
• Ribbon or twine
• Paper plate
• Felt
• White craft glue

Make This Project

8. Unicorn Ornaments

These unicorn ornaments (or unicorn-aments?) are so cute! Who wouldn’t want a unicorn on their tree?

Items Needed:

• Wooden round bauble
• White acrylic paint
• Paintbrush
• Gold glitter sticker foam sheet
• White foam sheet
• Rainbow yarn
• Black and pink permanent markers
• Tacky glue
• Scissors

Make This Project

9. Craft Stick Elf Ornament

Here’s another very simple and cheap ornament idea that is perfect for kids or toddlers. If your family has an elf on the shelf, then these DIY ornaments are even more relevant!

Items Needed:

• Craft stick
• Green paint
• Googly eyes
• Black marker
• Yellow ribbon
• Red button
• Green pipe cleaner
• Sparkly red pompom
• String

Make This Project

10. Silhouette Ornament

If you’re looking for the best keepsake ornament, this has got to be it. I love how nice these silhouette ornaments look and they’re surprisingly easy to make too.

Items Needed:

• Shrink film
• Black sharpie
• Single hole punch
• Thin, red ribbon or yarn
• Photo of your child

Make This Project

11. Gingerbread House Ornament

Gingerbread houses are a Christmas staple, so why not make a little Gingerbread House ornament that will last forever on your tree? These are so cute!

Items Needed:

• Paint pens
• Mini terra cotta pots
• Ribbon
• Small craft bells
• White acrylic paint
• Paintbrushes

Make This Project

12. Pom-Pom Teddy Bear Ornaments

This is such a clever craft! If you have some small ball ornaments lying around this is such a wonderful way to add some character to them.

Items Needed:

• 1 Small ball ornament
• 4 Small pom poms
• 4 Medium pom poms
• 1 Large pom pom
• Black puffy paint
• Ribbon
• Hot glue gun

Make This Project

13. Bottle Cap Penguins

If you’re looking for something really simple to make with your kids, it doesn’t get much easier than bottle cap penguins. You could probably make bottle cap snowmen too!

Items Needed:

• 2 bottle caps
• Sharpies or paint
• Orange ribbon
• Glue

Make This Project

14. Snowman Hat

If you or your kids are fans of Frosty the Snowman, you’ve got to make this hat ornament! For being made out of craft sticks it looks really good.

Items Needed:

• 5 miniature craft sticks
• 2 Standard craft sticks
• 3 Red buttons
• Green felt
• Pinking shears
• Tacky craft glue or low-temperature hot glue gun
• String
• Satin finish mod podge (optional)
• Paintbrushes
• Red acrylic paint
• Black acrylic paint

Make This Project

15. Reindeer Puzzle Piece Ornaments

If you have some spare puzzle pieces lying around you have GOT to make these simple reindeer ornaments for the holidays. So cute, easy, and festive!

Items Needed:

• Puzzle pieces
• Brown paint & paintbrush
• Hot glue & glue sticks
• Googly eyes
• Red pom-pom
• Green ribbon or twin

Make This Project

16. Yarn Angel

Yarn ornaments are always a lot of fun to create and this yarn angel ornament is a simple one to start with! Plus it looks really nice hanging on the tree.

Items Needed:

• Yarn
• Jumbo craft sticks
• Googly eyes
• Hot glue
• Scissors
• Black sharpie

Make This Project

17. Popsicle Stick Nutcracker

Christmas isn’t complete without nutcrackers! I absolutely love how these popsicle stick nutcrackers turn out and I’m sure the kids will love them too.

Items Needed:

• Standard craft sticks
• Miniature craft sticks
• Acrylic paint
• Paintbrushes
• White faux fur
• Low-temperature hot glue gun
• Red feathers
• Gold sequins
• Ornament string

Make This Project

18. Vintage Car with Tree

If your kids already have some toy cars lying around they can use them to make these ornaments! Such a clever idea and so easy to execute.

Items Needed:

• Vintage toy car
• Twine
• Toy tree

Make This Project

19. Tea Light Snowmen Ornaments

This is another perfect example of how to turn something ordinary into something amazing. I would have never thought of using tea lights to create light-up snowmen ornaments. Love it!

Items Needed:

• Battery operated tea lights
• Black sharpie
• Red ribbon
• Red pipe cleaners
• Red pom poms
• Black felt
• Orange sharpie
• Glue gun

Make This Project

20. Wooden Sled

Sledding is an exciting winter pastime so why not have an ornament to remind you of all the good times and laughs? This is a nice and easy craft for kids to help with.

Items Needed:

• Miniature craft sticks
• Standard craft sticks
• Twine
• Tacky craft glue or hot glue
• Red paint
• Silver paint
• Antiquing medium
• Paper towels
• Paintbrushes
• Wax paper
• Scissors

Make This Project

21. Mini Gumball Machine

While not necessarily holiday-themed, these gumball machine ornaments are still super cool. Great for kids too!

Items Needed:

• 3/4 x 5 inch cardstock
• Scrap of silver cardstock
• 1 1/2 inch Clear glass ball ornament
• Mutli-colored seed beads
• 1 1/2 inch diameter button
• 6 inches of Baker’s twine or ribbon
• Tacky glue
• Clothespin

Make This Project

22. Scrap Fabric Tree

If you have some scrap fabric lying around you may as well use it to make one of these really crafty homemade Christmas tree ornaments!

Items Needed:

• Fabric remnants
• Cinnamon sticks 6-inch
• Yellow buttons
• Low-temperature glue gun
• Twine
• Scissors

Make This Project

23. Vintage Bell Jar Ornaments

So cute. Put your favorite Christmas character figures inside these transparent bell ornaments and you’ve got a decor that kids will love.

While this ornament idea is a bit more complex than the ones above, I’m sure the kids could still help with it!

Items Needed:

• Plastic Wine Glasses
• Dremmel or Utility Knife
• Chipboard (cereal boxes, etc.)
• Scrapbook Paper
• Rubber Cement
• Trinkets
• Glitter
• Large Beads
• Pipe Cleaners
• Twine
• Scissors
• Hot Glue

Make This Project

24. Mini Mitten Ornaments

These Mini Mittens are as cute and adorable as a baby. It will definitely be fun to have an ornament like this hanging on your Christmas tree! Feel free to use different kinds of yarn colors for more variety!

Items Needed:

• Small amount of sockweight yarn in red and white
• Four size 2 double-pointed needles
• Tapestry needle
• 9 stitches and 11 rows per inch

Make This Project

25. DIY Melted Crayon Ornaments

Last but not least, some simple but very pretty melted crayon ornaments. These are very easy and fun to make, and each one turns out a little bit differently!

Items Needed:

• Clear glass ornaments
• Crayons
• Blow dryer

Make This Project

Final Thoughts

Doing some holiday crafting with the family is always a ton of fun and making DIY Christmas tree decorations together is just perfect. Over the years you’ll have a ton of different memories to look back on from your past crafting sessions.

Let us know which DIY Christmas tree ornaments you plan on making! Which are your favorites?

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• Frugal and Creative Gift Wrapping Ideas