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In this first edition of my Christmas Workshop series I’m walking you through how to make custom hand lettered ornaments using white, silver and gold paint pens and different coloured ornaments. Let’s dive in!

If you are more of a visual learner to check out my YouTube video tutorial on how I created these three different styles of ornaments!

The links below may be affiliate links where appropriate. This means that your purchase through these links may result in a few cents in payment to me, to support creating further resources like this one! That being said, I will never suggest supplies that I do not personally use and fully recommend.

Supplies you will need:
Ugly Christmas Sweater!!! ( optional haha! ) | White POSCA Water-based paint pen | Sharpie Oil-based markers | Liquid Chrome ( these only come in silver) | Pencil | Stabilo Glass Pencil | Chalk | Pencil Sharpener | Scrap piece of graph paper

TECHNIQUE #1:

For this first version we are going to be using a green matte ornament and a pencil to draw on your guidelines.

1. Take your ornament and write your word on it in pencil
2. Using the gold Sharpie Pen, give it a good shake and write on the ornament overtop of your pencil guideline.
Since we are doing “faux calligraphy” you will want to make sure to thicken the downstrokes as you go so you don’t smudge the writing.  If you have no idea what i’m talking about when I say faux calligraphy you can check out my video here!

3.  Add embellishments to your ornament. You can add dots, snowflakes and can draw it in pencil first if you are more comfortable.

TECHNIQUE #2:

The chalk transfer technique is great for longer words or designs.

1. Take any pen and write out your word on paper first.  For this example I chose “Just Married” as this is a very popular ornament this season.
2. Rip or cut out the portion of writing on the paper.
3. Turn over the paper and take the sharpened chalk and trace over your word.  Don’t press to hard and try to use the bare minimum so it doesn’t muck up your ornament.
4. Take the paper and put it on your ornament, hold or tape down one end of the paper
5. Use your pencil to trace over your word again.
6. Take the liquid chrome marker and write over the words, remembering to thicken your downstrokes as you go.
7. Once it has dried you can go in and remove the chalk, add in the year on the other side and voila!

TECHNIQUE #3:

The third version uses a clear ornament and the white Posca pen.

1. Write your word on the ornament with the Stabilo glass pencil.
2. Using the white Posca pen write overtop of your pencil guidelines. If you find the water based pen too streaky you can switch to a white Sharpie paint pen.
3. Add in some extra designs like snowflakes or dots that look like snow
4. Once dry remove any residue that is leftover.

These Christmas ornaments can make great personalized gifts for friends and family or can be used to decorate your own home and commemorate special events you want to remember.  Leave a comment below with your favorite technique and color combination.

Hope you enjoy doing these! Leave a comment below if you used it! 🙂