Pine Cone Ornaments

As I've said before, when you have a toddler, do not underestimate the classic crafts you used to do when you were a kid because they are still new and exciting for your little one. For me, introducing Baby Bear to some of my childhood crafts included making pine cone Christmas tree ornaments. I do not remember if I made these at school or with my mom, but I do remember hanging them on the tree when I was very young.

Pine cone ornaments are simple, but they can be very messy. We made ours in the bathroom so we would have a smooth, hard, easy-to-clean surface to work on as well as a bathtub nearby for washing up Baby Bear when we were done. To set up, I laid out three paper plates. I poured glue on the first plate, and I poured glitter of different colors on the other two plates. We also used pine cones Baby Bear collected from the yard during one of our outdoor play times (yes, we've entered the collecting stage). To start, I showed Baby Bear how to roll a pine cone in the glue and then roll it again in the glitter. As he worked on his pine cones, I showed him how to make sure there was glue all over the pine cone so that he could get more glitter. This went well for a while, and then Baby Bear decided that pouring and mixing the glitter would be fun. The multicolored glitter looked pretty on the pine cones, but it made quite a mess. We had to stop when all he wanted to do was mix the glitter... and then the glue!... together. Still, the handful of pine cones we completed were fun, and they are now hanging from our Christmas tree.