A few days ago I had one of the most fantastic times with my dear friend Kate. I’m sure you recall reading about her, as she’s the girl who I’m planning a trip to Europe with. She’s also my go to shopping partner!! A few weeks ago you might recall me posting about how Kate and I assembled a vintage Christmas tree together in her apartment. Unfortunately, we had no ornaments to decorate our tiny tree with, so we decided to make our own. During this fun filled evening we ate Taco Bell, drank our favorite Starbucks Peppermint Mochas, drank a bottle of wine, watched the live taping of Peter Pan that was released recently, and became the crafting queens. The night started with a trip to Patcatan’s which is a craft store, as you can guess. When we entered the store, we realized we didn’t exactly plan out what we needed very well. (The night that we assembled our tree, we had a Pinterest party to get some ideas for what ornaments to make.) So we made a quick verbal list of what we should get to at least get us started. We left the store with ornaments, black, silver, and pink glitter, a hot glue gun, black and yellow paint, paint brushes, and last but not least: googly eyes. After we finished up at Patcatans, we stopped at Giant Eagle so Kate could run in and get us a bottle of wine for the evening. A night with Miss Kate wouldn’t be complete without getting Taco Bell and Starbucks, so stops were made there as well and then we headed back to her apartment. If you take a look at my featured image, you’ll see our crafting table where all of the magic happened. Here’s a Pic Stitch collage of some of the ornaments that we made that night:

So I’m sure a lot of these ornaments are pretty self explanatory on what they are and how to make them, but here’s a little further detail on all of them:

Top left and bottom right Minion ornaments: If you’ve seen the movie Despicable Me, then you’ll know that these bulbs are supposed to be the Minions! Kate and I adore that movie, and when we saw this craft made on Pinterest, we knew that we had to give it a go. It’s as easy as it looks to make:

• Step 1) Paint the ornament yellow
• Step 2) Wait for the paint to dry and then paint a black band around the top of the ornament
• Step 3) Wait for the black paint to dry and then hot glue the googly eyes on
• Step 4) Complete your Minion by painting a little smile on it! 🙂

It’s up to you to decide whether your Minion ornament has one eye or two!!

Top right ornament: This was a really cool one that Kate made. She painted the outside of the ornament with a black paisley pattern and then she filled the bulb with red M&M’s. Super easy, super delicious.

Middle left and right ornament: At one point during our evening of crafting we both got quiet and were working intently on these ornaments for each other. When we both asked what the other was doing we each said something along the lines of “you can’t see it yet!” It turns out we were both making a name ornament for each other at the exact same time. If that isn’t best friend telepathy, then I don’t know what is!

• I wrote Kate’s name with hot glue and then coated the glue in silver glitter. I then cut a red heart out of construction paper and put it inside the ornament. Viola!
• Kate wrote my name in black paint and then put black glitter over top of it. She tore up red tissue paper and filled the inside of the bulb with it. Done.

Center candy cane reindeer: This is our beloved reindeer named Albert. Isn’t he the cutest?! Making this ornament is exactly how it looks like you would make it:

• Step 1) Cut out antlers for the reindeer with brown foam paper and hot glue it onto the candy cane
• Step 2) Cut out circles from the brown foam paper and hot glue googly eyes onto the circles. Then hot glue these onto the candy cane for the eyes
• Step 3) Hot glue a red M&M onto the tip of the candy cane for the nose
• Step 4) Wrap a ribbon around the neck of the candy cane and now you have your very own Albert!

Bottom left and center ornaments: These ornaments were made simply with paper and glitter.

• On the bottom left ornament I drew the British flag, the German flag, and a tiny Eiffel Tower and then cut them out and stuck them in the inside of the ornament along with an ample amount of silver glitter. This little baby obviously symbolizes our European trip dream which will be happening in 2016!
• The bottom center ornaments have the same “message in a bottle” idea as our dream ornament. They also have glitter….lots of glitter 🙂

So there you have it, some fun make shift crafts to get you in the holiday spirit!! Kate and I had such a blast making these. We also had an equally fun time drinking some delicious blackberry wine and enjoying Peter Pan Live. Here’s a little clip from it and if you haven’t seen the full movie, I can’t recommend it enough!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wE-G1NHKQTc

Do you have any fun last minute holiday crafts to recommend? Did you make a seasonal craft that you were particularly proud of? I want to hear all about it, so leave me a comment and let’s chat! Happy Monday! -Sarah

PS: My brother is home for the holidays!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HURRAY!!!!!!!!!!! Lil Red is a happy camper :))))