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Glittered Christmas Ornaments in Your Favorite Color

Glittered Christmas Ornaments in Your Favorite Color

Posted By: I Love Christmas! Times Read: 1578

Your Tree - Your Colors - Decorated Your Way

The most obvious benefit of glittering your own ornaments is that you can have whatever color you want - purple, orange, teal/turquoise, copper, pink, navy, yellow, whatever. Especially if your favorite color is not popular for Christmas ornaments. You are only limited by your imagination and the availability of glitter in your color.


    

About twenty-five years ago, I became disabled and confined to bed. Putting up a Christmas tree was more than I could handle and not having one, sheer torture for a Christmas nut. :-) In 2012 I decided to reclaim that part of my life and make renewed plans for holiday decorating. My older ornaments were burgundy and gold so, I bought red glass icicles to update them. The seller included a sample of a teal blue icicle and a green one in the order. Just to see how it would look, I put a blue one on my tree. It completely changed my holiday decorations and color scheme. But new turquoise glass ornaments were difficult to find in the stores. A couple of years ago, I decided to try glittering old, damaged torpedo/icicle glass ornaments with my two favorite colors: turquoise and burgundy. Later, I added a row of gold sequin ribbon trim to glam up all my double-dip glass ornaments (as seen above).

  Turquoise glass icicle from Glasswich, a Seller at eBay. Other colors are available.

Color trends at that time indicated that turquoise was about to make a comeback. Thinking this would be a great color for ornaments, I started a search. There was nothing to be had. Ebay had lots of sellers listing old ornaments from the first decade that color was popular for Christmas (1950's- early 70's.) Most of which show the wear from years of use. But, no one was selling new turquoise glass ornaments. Thus began my foray into the world of creating my own ornaments. Martha Stewart glitter products to the rescue. :-)

                Glass ornaments with turquoise glitter inside and out

As you can see from the photo on the left, some ornaments I coated with glitter and others I filled with glitter. Some have glitter sprinkled on, some were covered with glitter and clear glass beads, some covered with paint and glitter.  Choosing the base color of the ornament you are glittering is important because it will show through the glitter. My preference color for ornaments to be filled is clear.  For the turquoise and teal ornaments to be glittered or painted over, I started with blue and green ornaments. I did purple and red ornaments for my nieces and started theirs by glittering over old red and pink ornaments. I think you get the idea.

The spiral ornament below was more difficult to glitter and, I had to use spray glue. I set the ornament down into a disposable plastic glass, doing half of the ornament in one setting, allowing it to dry before tackling the other. The spirals are not glass - they were sold as glass on eBay. But suspicious of their true content, I 'sacrificed' one by dropping it on a concrete surface. The durned thing bounced halfway across the floor without breaking! Clearly, not glass.

      

Examples of burgundy and turquoise, silver and turquoise, purple and gold "double dips" as I call them.

If you prefer glass ornaments, so much the better. Get as many as you can for your tree now and a few for future projects. Many ornament manufacturers are moving towards "shatterproof" (plastic) and there may come a time when glass ornaments in this shape are no longer available.

Year round, eBay is the best source for old glass ornaments. Lots of folks are now clearing out the Christmas ornament collections of parents and grandparents and selling them cheap.  Look for "lots" of 8+ ornaments, $10-15 or less with shipping. Search under "glass icicle Christmas ornaments", "glass teardrop Christmas ornaments",  "glass torpedo Christmas ornaments".  Torpedo is the harmless name under which they were sold back in the day because of their shape which resembled WWII military equipment. Depending upon the height and width of your tree, you will need 24-60 ornaments for maximum impact. 36-48  3" ornaments on a 5 ft tall tree is a nice look - sufficient without overdoing it. Smaller ornaments can support 48-72 pieces on a 5 ft tree.

The best time to find a large lot of glass ornaments at eBay is in the spring-early fall, or between April and September. After Halloween, ornament sellers count on the demand and the prices go up. Ornaments are also available around that time at your local second-hand store such as Goodwill, the Salvation Army, St. Vincent dePaul, Veterans Thrift and consignment thrift stores. Be sure to check out my project sheet for glittering glass ornaments for specific help with this project.


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Thanks for visiting I Love Christmas.com holiday decorating blog. Use our Contact Form to request permission to reprint or quote from this article. For more Christmas decorating ideas visit my Christmas blog: https://www.i-love-christmas.com/Christmas-Decorating-Ideas . Get beautiful, handmade glass ornaments, garlands, metal ornament trees, ornament hooks, tabletop Christmas trees, photo ornaments and other holiday decorations at I Love Christmas! https://www.i-love-christmas.com . Silk Christmas tree skirt with Nativity in the first image was custom made from turquoise quilted silk with AB rhinestones and turquoise flourishes. Note that I assume no liability for the use or misuse of these instructions or those provided by the product manufacturers.

Tags: Glittered Christmas Ornaments, How to Glitter Your Own Christmas Ornaments

Visit our other websites: KCIC Christmas Ornaments for Christmas Ornaments with a Bible verse and Silk Christmas Tree Skirts for a custom-made silk Christmas tree skirt.