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How to Decorate Christmas Baubles with Kids
Are you looking for Christmas bauble decorating craft ideas to make with kids? If so, we have some great projects on this page for you, together with some tips to help you.
Children love bauble decorating craft activities. Although the results can vary widely, every child will still hang their bauble on their Christmas tree with pride.
Which Baubles?
You can use many different bases for bauble making craft projects with children. The obvious choice is traditional plastic Christmas tree baubles. We sell a great range of these, buying specifically the colours and designs that will be popular for kids craft projects.
You could also use card bauble shapes, two part plastic baubles that open up, styrofoam balls, giant pom poms - the options are almost endless.
The type of bauble base that you choose will probably depend on the age and ability of the crafters, your budget and what you want to stick to them (the baubles not the crafters!) - please see our "sticky" tips below.
The Cheapest Option
The cheapest option, as always, is to use card bauble shapes. We sell a great range of these ready cut shapes, both with and without hangers. You can just colour the white ones in and all of them can be embellished with jewels, mini pom poms, glitter, glitter glue and sequins.
Glitter - glitter - glitter is generally children's preferred option!
Of course, you could make these from sheets of card, scissors (normal or shaped) and a hole punch - tinsel pipe cleaners make great hangers for home made Christmas baubles. The finished shape won't be as good as you would get from one of our precut shapes but it will be cheaper and the craft will take longer too!
Plastic Baubles
Plastic baubles do work well but really work best with sticky shapes and self adhesive gems on the body and then other craft supplies such as feathers, pipe cleaners and beads attached around the neck of the bauble - please see our notes below on sticking items to baubles.
You can get some really great results with these and they do have a more traditional Christmas feel about them. Also, they come in a great range of bright metallic colours, as well as more subtle browns and whites for a more contemporary or reindeer and snowman look.
Styrofoam Balls
We have many different sizes of styrofoam balls and compressed paper balls, which you can use for kids bauble decorating crafts - we even have the hanging hooks specifically for these. Both materials can be painted and then embellished with all sorts of children's craft supplies.
We have lots of other information on decorating styrofoam, which you may like to take a look at.
Paper Mache Baubles
In the same way as styrofoam, paper mache baubles are great for kids as they accept acrylic paint very well and dry quickly as they are so absorbant!
They are also lovely and light, they come in a great range of shapes and generally include an integrated hanging cord too - what more can you ask from a simple paper mache bauble!
Decorating & The Sticky Stuff!
What can you decorate your bauble with and what glue should you use?
It is probably best to address the glue issue first. As you will see from the image above, it is very difficult to use glue on plastic baubles as most kids craft glues will not stick to non-porous surfaces. We have tried to stick beads to a plastic bauble with our tacky glue, which is really the best quality PVA glue you can buy, as it is immediately tacky and dries quickly. As you will see we have experienced what we call the "PVA slide", where the embellishments have slipped down the side of the bauble. You can get away with using a good quality PVA with lighter materials such as foam, feathers and felt but you will still need to allow drying time on all items, specifically plastic baubles.
That said, if you are decorating card baubles, paper mache baubles or styrofoam baubles (which are all pourous) you will find that PVA works better but the bauble still needs to be kept flat.
As an alternative to glue, you could use double sided sticky tape or 3D sticky foam pads - these both work on all sorts of baubles.
Where possible though, we would recommend that you always use self adhesive shapes, sticky jewels and stickers on any 3D shapes.
If you are decorating 3D baubles, you will need to stop the bauble rolling around. Cut up cardboard toilet or kitchen rolls work well for this. The bauble can then also be left in this to dry. As an alternative idea, you could decorate these card rolls when finished, perhaps with a place name for the table, so the baubles could sit in them on the Christmas table.
Turning now to embellishments for your baubles, the sky is really the limit.... We have made some suggestions below but don't be limited by these - use your imagination and the contents of your craft box!
Glitter
Glitter glue
Sequins
Gems & jewels
Mini pom poms
Foam
Felt
Feathers
Tinsel pipe cleaners
Metallic beads
Pom poms
Googly eyes
Tacky glue
3d foam pads
Double sided tape
Sequin & Pin Baubles
As an alternative bauble decorating craft idea for older kids you may like our sequin and pin bauble kits.
You could make pretty baubles, reindeer baubles, Christmas pudding baubles and other Christmas designs too?
Our top tip on using these group packs is to split the contents of the pack equally between the crafters BEFORE the craft session starts. This will make sure that all crafters have their fair share of sequins, pins and embellishments and that they can complete their craft project.
Why not take a look at our range today?
Keep it Simple
You can make your projects as simple or as complicated as you want.
The example above has been made using self adhesive jewels. The jewels have a little sticky pad attached to the back, which makes them perfect for this simple kids Christmas craft.
If this is too simple, you could always add some glitter glue details on the body of the bauble or some tinsel pipe cleaners around the neck - wound around a pencil to make a coil.
Robin Bauble Making for Young Kids
We have a great range of brown coloured plastic baubles, which we have sourced specifically for robin and reindeer bauble crafts.
This simple robin bauble kit is great for younger kids and really is something different. We love completing robin crafts with kids, as they make a nice change from reindeer, snowmen and Christmas trees.
This idea would make a lovely little gift for a Mum or Nan to hang on their tree for years to come...
It is made using a brown bauble, brown feathers, red felt, orange foam, 10mm wobbly eyes and tacky glue - that's all!
Note - please bear in mind that you need to use a decent glue on these - a good tacky glue is best. They need to be made on a cardboard tube (see above) with the embellished part of the bauble facing upwards and left this way until dry.
Robin Bauble Making for Older Kids
By way of contrast, we thought that it would be a good idea to give you a robin bauble making craft project that is suited more for older kids and adults too.
This robin has been made from a styrofoam ball, with a hanging hook and ribbon. This has then been covered with a watery PVA glue before being rolled in red glitter and gold glitter. The best way to do this is to paint the glue where the gold glitter will be and then roll in gold glitter. Then, painting glue where the red glitter will be and gently pressing the red glitter in place. This keeps the two glitter colours clear and distinct.
The details have been added with orange card (you could use orange foam or orange felt), brown felt and 10mm googly eyes. Tacky glue is the best glue for sticking embellishments to glitter.
Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer Bauble Craft Idea
We must be a big bunch of kids at littlecraftybugs because we love Rudolph craft projects - we can't get enough of the big red noses and googly eyes! We hope you like our Rudolph bauble decorating idea.
Again, this is a fairly simple idea and easy for kids to complete.
If you tried from now until Christmas you would never be able to stick the tinsel antlers to the bauble - these need to be twisted around the neck of the bauble, with extra little bits twisted around the main tinsel pipe cleaners to make the antlers.
The 15mm googly eyes and red pom pom nose have been stuck on with a good tacky glue (see note above about keeping this flat). We have then drawn on a mouth with a permanent black marker but you could use a metallic marker, small piece of black or red foam or even glitter glue.
So, to make this you will need a brown bauble (or gold), 15mm googly eyes, gold tinsel pipe cleaner (or brown), 12mm red pom pom and something to add the mouth with (see above).
A top tip here is to snip a little (stressing a "little") bit of the red pom pom away on the back, which will then give a flatter surface to help it stick to the bauble.
Two Part Plastic Fillable Baubles
These two-part plastic baubles are great, they come in a great range of designs and sizes and are really versatile.
You can embellish the outside of these in the same way as other baubles, with the added option of adding gifts and embellishments to the inside. Foil shred and foil wrapped sweets work really well as a filler and provide a lovely background to the embellishments on the outside.
Please bear in mind all the comments made above about sticking items to plastic baubles. Also - without wanting to state the obvious - when decorating them, please remember that they are meant to be opened!
Classic Look Baubles
These more classical looking baubles are ideal for older kids. They are made using peel off or outline stickers and gems.
We have finished our example with ribbons tied into bows but the options for these are almost endless.
Felt Letters
Why not cut out felt letters or Christmas shapes to embellish your baubles, these will really add a personalised touch.
You could also use small foam self adhesive letters or peel off alphabet stickers. Making your own letters from felt does work best though, as the felt will more easily follow the contours of the bauble.
Peel Off Stickers
Peel off stickers, also called outline stickers, are normally reserved for adult crafters as they are difficult for young kids to use. We have lots of these in our craftybugs.co.uk adult craft shop.
However, if you are working with a group of older crafters, you can achieve a very different result with these, especially when completed with festive ribbons and jewels.
A Touch of Luxury
This bauble has a real touch of luxury, which is very easy to achieve and can be very, very effective.
As before, much of the decoration has been based around the neck of the bauble but you can see from the image above how well this can work.
We have used curling ribbon and tinsel pipe cleaners to attach feathers and jingle bells. The bauble has then been finished with a Christmas peel off sticker.
These could be made in all different colours and even in a really bright selection of kiddie primary colours for a really different look.
Bauble Decorating Craft Supplies
Plastic baubles
Paper mache baubles
Styrofoam baubles
Two-part plastic baubles
Glitter
Glitter glue
Sequins
Gems & jewels
Mini pom poms
Foam
Felt
Feathers
Tinsel pipe cleaners
Metallic beads
Pom poms
Googly eyes
Tacky glue
3d foam pads
Double sided tape
Bauble Decorating - So Many Options!
There are so, so many ways that children can decorate the myriad of baubles that are available, using a whole range of craft supplies - we hope that you've found these ideas and suggestions for kids bauble making crafts helpful.
As always, if you have anything you would like to add about this or any other children's craft ideas, we would be delighted to hear from you.
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