You get some sprinkles! And you get some sprinkles! And YOU get some sprinkles!

Craft number three and I think it might be my favorite one.

It all started with this set of pens I bought a few months ago. I adore this color scheme (craft room 2021 goal.) As someone who has a pretty neutral palette for the rest of my house, the flip side of my brain loves bright colors with a stark white background. So I took my pens to Michael’s with me as I was picking out my 2020’s 20 Holiday Crafts projects.

There are two projects here: ornaments with sprinkles and drip paint ornaments.

EEP! I love them both so much.

Here’s how I did them.

For the sprinkles: For assistance, cut the tops off a few water bottles so your clear glass ornament can rest inside (holiday stuff is 50% off right now so go grab a few containers of these.)

Carefully take the metal top off the ornaments. Using clear varnish of any kind, pour a few tablespoons inside your ornament. I used a piping bag but it would’ve been much easier had I had a funnel (which you can’t use for food afterwards, obviously.)

Roll the ornament around until the varnish is coating the whole inside of the ornament.

Then turn the ornament upside down on the water bottle. You could also use Dixie cups or something similar.

It’s important you make yourself wait 30 minutes. The varnish needs to dry somewhat but still have a sticky texture.

Using a different funnel, start filling the bottom of your ornament with sprinkles (below I will go through my trial and errors with different kinds.)

Keep adding sprinkles until you can move them all around the inside of the ornament. If the varnish is still too wet, the sprinkle’s colored coating will ‘melt off’ and it won’t stick to the ornament. I waited 30 minutes each time and it always worked. So there’s no pressure, take your time.

Replace the metal top of the ornament and voila! – you’re done!

I’m not saying this is a ‘neat and tidy’ craft. Our dog, Tilly, might be eating sprinkles off the floor for the next few months.

The drip paint ornament was a lot of fun. It goes against everything I’ve ever known about painting. Mixing paint colors together while still wet makes one big muddy mess of a color. But the flip side of the paint looks so pretty!

I again used some water bottles with the top cut off. Take the metal top off your ornament. I found it very helpful to keep my paint bottles well-shaken and turned upside down. The paint needs to be ready to squirt out when you need it.

And that’s all you do. Squirt one color, then turn the ornament and squirt out a little of the next color, etc.

As your ornament fills up, turn it around to find uncovered areas and squeeze a little more paint into those places.

You’ll go through a lot of excess paint. The paint overlaps and that’s completely okay.

Once the sides are covered then turn your ornament upside down to let it dry. I found the best way to let them dry is to leave them upside down overnight.

The color combinations for both projects are vast. Go with traditional red and white. Or maybe gold. The vibrancy of the drip paint inside the clear glass is magnified and beautiful. I plan on making more of these very soon.

Here are some thoughts on the various sprinkles I used…

The small dot confetti is the absolute best coverage, no doubt about it. In the below ornament I started with some star sprinkles but they are heavier and don’t fully cover the inside so I also poured in some small dots to fill in the gaps. I like the result, but it was a little anxiety-producing at first. -ha

Then I mixed some sprinkles together to see how they’d do (did I mention I really like sprinkles and have a variety of them at home!)

The type of sprinkles that did not work well at all are the ‘pearlized’ sprinkles. The texture doesn’t adhere as well as the other sprinkles. I was disappointed, thinking some white and clear would look magical too. Had these not been pearlized it would be a nice snowy look.

I love the way these turned out and will certainly make more this season. I have a tabletop white tree that I think these will go perfectly on. But then again, this bowl full of goodness is making me happy just the way they are.

Please give this one a try. You’ll love the outcome! (and so will your puppy.)