DIY Beach Ornament

Good Afternoon! 

Today I have a great little craft project. I am talking ornaments today. I know, ornaments?! What the heck?! Well, these are actually ornaments that you could display all year long. They make a great keepsake and the supplies can be gathered while you are on vacation!

This is what you will be making:

Supplies:

• Sand (can be gathered when on vacation)
• Glitter (optional)
• Small Shells (can be gathered when on vacation)
• Small picture
• Tweezers
• Scissors
• Small funnel
• Glass ornament bulb
• Hanger for your ornament

Process:

First, choose the picture you want in your ornament. Have it printed, then shrink it-a lot! I shrunk mine by 50% on to regular printer paper. I wound up being 2" by 2". Seems small, but those bulbs are tiny.

I chose this picture of my daughter with my niece and my nephew on the beach at my parent's beach house in Florida. It's so wonderful the way they were standing holding hands with the oldest in the middle. The picture just makes me smile and lets me remember the fun times we had that summer. Not only does this photo hold great memories, but it is simple. There isn't a ton to look at. The children are the focus and it clearly shows where we are.

Next, take the bulb and remove the top. 

Then, putting the small funnel in the top pour in the desired amount of sand. One very, very, very important thing to remember here is sand is very heavy. So this will add quite a bit of weight to the ornaments, so add it sparingly. I then added a tiny bit of glitter to give the sand some color. Once you have that in there place your finger over the top of the ornament and shake a bit to mix it up.

Now, this part coming up was the most difficult for me, personally.

Take the picture and trim it to desired size. Then, roll it up and put it in the ornament. If you are a perfectionist this is where I apologize to you. Using the tweezers manipulate the photo so it is in the position you would like. At some point you will have to accept that the photo looks good enough positioned a certain way, remember it looks better than you think it does most likely. Once you have it to that point of this looks awesome, using the tweezers gently push the picture into the sand to stabilize it.

Toss in a few tiny shells for some ornamentation.

On the front or back write the year using a sharpie. I sent the final product to a couple of friends (who all live in different places and I sent the messages separately so as not to "taint" the answers) and they unanimously agreed the year actually looked best written across the front...you can see it below.

 You can also add a tag at the top marking the place along with a nice ribbon to hang it from!

This makes a great keepsake for a beach vacation or to give as a gift at-don't kill me for saying it-Christmas!