Santa Hand Ornament

In my family, the ornaments that the kids are most embarrassed by and that the parents adore are the ones we made in elementary school. So this is one you could easily make with your kids and bring it out year after year without their faces turning too red! I found this post by Shelley Jo Moozings and while I don't have kids myself, I gave it a whirl to see just how easy it was to make.

Start off by making the dough - 4 cups of flour, 1 cup of salt, and 1 1/2 cups of water mixed in a big bowl. Now she recommends kneading the dough for 15-20 minutes but your arms will be tired after 5, maybe 10. Really, just knead it until you can form it into a nice ball.

Next, bust out your rolling pin! Take your ball of dough, place it on a floured surface, and with your rolling pin, roll it out to the thickness you want the ornament to be (note: in my experience, the thicker the dough, the longer in the oven. However, the thicker the dough, the easier to glue the pieces back together should it break when your cat tries to climb up the Christmas tree!). Take your child's hand, your hand, your pet's paw, and push it into the dough.

(I'm sure it's much cuter the small the handprint, so you'll have to bear with and my ogre hands.)

Trace around the print using a knife. Now this is a very important step: don't forget to put a hole in the top so you're able to hang it!

Now comes the waiting game. The instructions said to stick it in the oven at 300 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until golden. I had mine in the oven for 40 minutes but I probably should have left it in there for an hour. Wasn't golden but it worked!

Next came the painting. Now you don't have to paint it, you could take a red and black marker, draw on the hat, beard, eyes and nose and be done. However, if you want a pure white background, paint the sucker. Doesn't take that long to try, I gave it 20 minutes. Don't forget to paint the sides too, if your ornament is thick! Here's a photo of the four paints I ended up using - white, red, black, and yellow.


One tip I recommend? Once the white paint dry, take a red marker and black marker and trace around the areas you're going to paint before painting. This way, it'll give you a nice template and you can paint within the lines.

Now I tried to paint it exactly like the original but because I don't have the hands of a 5 year old, it did look a bit... longer. Still, it didn't take that long and it's a nice, unique, fun ornament for the tree!

TOTAL COSTS: Free!

But that's because I had flour, salt, water, and paint on hand. If you don't have paint available, you can pick up 2oz. bottles at Blick Art Supplies or Utrecht for as cheap as $1.99/bottle

TOTAL AMOUNT OF TIME: About an hour and a half

25 minutes to make dough and cut out hand

40 minutes to bake

40 minutes to cool 

30 minutes to paint

EASY-PEASY SCALE (1 super easy - 5 very difficult): 2 out of 5

This should be easy enough for a kid do to do (with adult supervision). This would make a great gift or pass down ornament in your family. Enjoy!