Paper Ornaments for the Family Traditions Tree

In the back of my mind I've been wanting to redo this tree for years. But the first batch of ornaments took me so dang long, and I always had some other goal that needed attention, so year after year it went neglected.

This year I knew it was time to address this, so I had to come up with some extra extra cheap and quick ornaments. I bought a pack of scrapbook paper made by American Crafts (Who I LOVE. They're a great company with gorgeous designs.) and searched the internet for every kind of paper ornament I could find.

These are all crazy easy. And you can't get cheaper than paper, so they're perfect for a "disposable" application like changing a color scheme year to year, or, like my friend who's getting married on December 20th, decorating a winter wedding tree.



The globe ornament is an oldy but goody that I've seen everywhere from Carol Duvall to Martha Stewart and at a million different websites across the internet. Here's Martha's latest iteration.

The ornament made out of paper strips is pretty much instinctual. In fact, as I've been checking out the blogs of some of you commenters, I came across these exact ornaments, in the exact same American Craft paper pack. Sorry I can't remember who's it was, but I got quite a kick out of seeing it. I just cut a ton of paper strips to some random size that looked good to me, punched holes in both ends, and secured them with brads. I made sure to make the inside look pretty too, so I lined up the paper strips wrong sides together before I put the brads in.

The heart is the only paper ornament that can claim any originality.


Cut four strips of paper to 12" by 1 1/2", and four strips of paper 8" by 1 1/2". I think this looks best when you use four different papers so that you end up with different patterns on each surface of the heart. But for today we'll just go with two.


Glue two 12" strips back to back, the other two 12" strips back to back and then both sets of 8" strips back to back so that you're left with four double sided strips with different patterns on both sides.


Line up all four strips to be even on one side. You have to arrange them so that when you bend them over in the next step, the patterns will all be in the right place. Put the 12" strips right sides together (and by right sides I mean the side you want facing outside of the heart), then put one 8" strip on each side with the right side of the 8" strip facing the wrong side of the 12" strip. This is one of those things that's kind of hard to explain, but ridiculously easy in practice. You'll see what I'm talking about as soon as you have the strips in your hands.


Bend the top end of each strip over to meet the bottom end where you've got everything all lined up together. See? There's your heart. If you got any of your strips facing the wrong way, now's your chance to fix them.


Secure the end with a couple staples. I covered the staple with another little paper strip, but you could also use ribbon, or just a pretty staple and leave it exposed.


I used a little glue to stick a hanger between the curves of the heart. This also had the added benefit of making the heart a little more sturdy.