If you have looked around my blog for any amount of time, you probably realize that I love ornaments! When I pull down my tree each Christmas and sort through all the ornaments it’s like reading my life’s story. A few years back I wanted to make some ornaments as gifts and of course for myself! I went onto Pinterest and found a picture of a gorgeous ornament that I wanted to make. Little did I realize when I undertook this endeavor how hard it would be to figure out this craft!

Unfortunately, the picture on Pinterest didn’t have much instructions with it so I fussed with the size of the foam ball. Also, I struggled with the fact that no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get the beads to cover all of the white of the foam ball (so frustrating). This is one of those times where I almost threw in the towel! I know total shock! Luckily, the towel didn’t get thrown (although a foam ball did). While cleaning up my craft supplies, I stumbled onto some extra sequins and a light bulb went off! So, I quickly started the ornament again with great success (thank God because I had already bought and opened all the beads).

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What You Need!

• Glass Beads Variety of Sizes and Shapes
• 10/0 Seed Beads To Match Bead Color
• 8 mm Sequins To Match Bead Color
• 3/8 Inch Coordinating Ribbon
• 1.4 Inch Foam Ball
• Dressmaker Pins Size 20 1 1/4 Inch
• Glue Gun
• Glue Sticks

What I Used!

These are the beads that I used for this ornament. Notice that they are all different sizes and shapes. For this size foam ball I wouldn’t go bigger than 8 mm beads.

What to Do!

To begin the glass bead Christmas ornament add different size beads to a dressmaker pin then add a sequin. There is no right or wrong way of do this!

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Next, add a little hot glue to end of needle and insert into the foam ball.

To cover all the white of the foam ball overlap the last sequin with the next sequin.

Keep adding beaded needles in a sporadic pattern. Make sure to vary the heights of the beaded needles to give your ornament more depth. Continue beading until you have covered most of the foam ball.

Cut 7 1/2 inches from your 3/8 inch ribbon.

Hot glue the first side of your ribbon down making sure to get pretty close to the sequins.

Put the other side of the ribbon down and use straight pins to hold it down. Make sure that your ribbon is a perfect circle and not twisted.

Take a beaded needle and insert it into the center of the ribbon to cover up the plain needles you put in. I like to use a shorter beaded needle here. If you put a tall one here it might get in the way of the tree branch when you go to hang it.

Start beading again making sure to slip the sequins under the ribbon so you don’t see any of the foam ball. Fill in the rest of the open spaces.

Once you have covered every inch of the foam ball with beaded pins you’re done! Your new sparkly glass bead ornament is ready to display or to be given! Below are some of the other colors that I’ve made this glass ornament in.

This green ornament is really cool because I used different shapes of glass beads. I was really nervous at first to use square and tubular beads with the round ones but when it was finished I was really happy with the unique look.

This color is my mom’s favorite because she loves all things gold!

I’ve noticed that the lighter colored ornaments tend to sparkle more when added to the Christmas tree. You could totally make this glass ornament out of any color beads but just be aware that the gold ornament reflects the light of the Christmas tree way better than the dark blue one. So, what color will you make your glass bead Christmas ornament?

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