Glass Ornaments

I'm a sucker for Christmas ornaments. I've been collecting them since I was about ten years old and I have all kinds of pretties from all over the world. However, nearest and dearest to my heart are the ornaments that people have made for me - the felt mice that my sister stitched, a teensy bunny on a fluffy bed of cotton ball snow inside of an old instamatic camera flash bulb (yes, I'm that old!), a couple of walnuts sprayed with gold and festooned with red ribbons, a squirrel (made from a pecan and a hazelnut) wearing a stocking cap... the list goes on.

It's no wonder that I also like to make and give ornaments to people. These examples, that I'll be talking about today, are so simple and so much fun. They are translucent enough that the light shines through them (so pretty on all that sparkly glitter), so they could even be used as suncatchers!

To make the two different varieties of ornaments featured here, you will need:
Memory Glass - which is available in different sizes. I happened to have 2x2" on hand, so I used that.
Solvent ink pads and inks - I use StazOn Ink Pads and Sharpies
Tsukineko Essential Glue Pad
Alcohol Ink
Art Institute Ultrafine Glitter
Foil Tape
Cord or string for hanging the ornament
1/8" Ribbon for added decoration
Good, fast drying glue - I use superglue
Gel pens (optional) - I used metallic gold, white, and glittery yellow to color in some items.

The stamps used in these examples are from Blockheads sets: An Illustrated Christmas and Winter Wonderland.

To make the ornament above, I began by patting one side of a piece of glass on my glue pad, which I then doused with ultra fine glitter. On a second piece of glass, I stamped the tree image, and then colored it in using a white gel pen for the snow and a brown sharpie for the trunk. You don't need to worry about staying perfectly within the lines because you'll be putting the image stamped side down on top of the glitter.

Once the two pieces are sandwiched together - again, the glitter side and the image side should be together. Take the "sandwich" and press it onto foil tape. Here's where I tell you a couple of things to note about working with foil tape (which can be a bit obstreperous). Don't cut the tape until you've finished rapping your project - it's much easier to control and use when it's still on the spool. Also, don't peel off all the backing at once, but unroll the backing as you go.

Flatten the overlapping foil with an old credit card, bone folder, brayer... whatever works best for you. Then glue the cord or string to the back of the ornament and glue the ribbon on the front.

In the following two examples, I used alcohol inks rather than the glue pad and glitter. Alcohol inks are so much fun to play with, and when you use them on glass you can easily make them as dense or as washed out as you wish.

I used StazOn Cotton White ink to stamp my images. I really love how the white stands out against the colors of the alcohol inks.

Also, on the "Swirls" ornament I colored in the ornament with Stickles (Chrystal) to give it a little more bling. Again, be sure to put the stamped and colored side down.