Shrinky Dinky Christmas Ornaments

Hey everyone! Congratulations to all the Diamonds Stencil Winners from our last Blog Hop. You should have all received your stencils by now and hopefully are happily playing with them!

Today I have a few projects for you showing how you can make some last minute Christmas ornaments. One is pretty easy... and the other isn't :-) 

Who has played with Shrinky Dinks? You know, it's not just for children! When I first got the Diamonds Stencils, I was thinking of things to do "out of the ordinary" and I had just found my pack of shrinky dinks (um, still packed away in a box from when I moved!) I decided to try something different. AND you'll see how I screwed it up and finished it anyway!

When you first get your sheet of "Polyshrink Plastic" out you'll notice that it is shiny on both sides. We can't have that. There is nothing for the ink or colored pencil to stick to.

Get out your handy sanding block, or just some plain old FINE grit sandpaper. Scuff up the sheet on ONE side only. Go in all directions. Vertical, horizontal, diagonally both ways. This is what the ink or color is going to stick to. You can see how shiny it is by the reflection of my lap at the bottom.

Now you can see how scuffed it is by the reflection. Note to self: scuff it up even more next time. Colored pencil adheres much better the more rough it is.

So the first one I tried was only a part of the Flanders Stencils, the center area. I traced it onto the stencil on the rough side and colored the pieces in with some Prismacolor colored pencils. You want to get as dense of pigment down as possible. I cut the shape out carefully, including a little hangy hole. You will see the shrunk piece at the end.

For the next piece, I used the Heart Stencil from the Diamond Series. I was taking a BIG risk in doing something this large. But what the heck... I'm a rebel. I used StazOn ink in Red and a makeup sponge and stenciled through on the rough side of the plastic.

So it looked like this.

I cut around the shape leaving about 1/4" edge all around, and included a little area where I punched a hole with a regular 1/4" hole punch up in the crack of the heart so I could put a string through it. Now you get to watch a real-time video where I show it shrinking. And you can see how I almost screwed up the whole thing by trying to shrink something that big with a heat gun. It stuck together but I managed to pry it apart and save the day.

Between the two, I think the Heart came out better, because I used the StazOn ink. It was a more even coverage. The Flanders ornament shrunk nicely (and quickly) but you can still see some of the roughness and some pencil strokes. It's really hard to get a good picture of these guys!

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