I love this time of year! Little Johnny Jump Ups and pansies greet us in stores -which I can’t resist!  I brought some home and planted them in the pots by our front door. As I was looking through magazines this week, I saw a photo that combined these spring flowers and cookies….so of course, I had to try making them. They turned out so pretty. Use your favorite cookie recipe, or the recipe below.

Easter is on the way! These cupcakes are so easy to decorate-kids would love to help you! Bake your favorite cupcakes, top with frosting and green sprinkles or shreds and add your favorite Easter eggs or candy.

We have been making these Chocolate Party Cupcakes for years – they are so good! They have a delicious cream cheese and chocolate chip filling-YUM! Great for holidays, birthdays and whenever you have a chocolate craving. Enjoy!!!!

Here is a fun project to do with little kids, big kids – or all by yourself! Grab some clay, cookie cutters and your rolling pin. Then look through your drawers and gather up ribbon, paint, markers, stickers and googly eyes.

Last Christmas I had made some ornaments out of this air dry clay and really liked using it. It is easy to work with and no baking is required. This package made about 3 dozen ornaments. To begin, remove the clay from the package and knead it a few times. Then roll out the clay on a smooth surface, using a regular rolling pin. You can use other kinds of clay, or make your own.

After you roll the dough, you are ready to get out your favorite cookie cutters and start creating! If you are using the embossed rolling pin, firmly roll it over your smoothed out clay.

Carefully place the ornaments on a baking sheet, lined with parchment paper or a silicone mat. You can gather up the leftover clay and make more designs. The great thing about this clay is that if you don’t like the way the design turns out, just re-roll it and try again.

Use a straw or skewer to make a hole in the top of each ornament. I used a small heart cutter to create a heart in some of the bunnies, then saved the hearts and used them for a cute little bunny tails on other bunnies.

Have fun experimenting with your cookie cutters and rolling pins. I rolled the embossed rolling pin one direction and then the other to make more texture on the “wool” on some of the sheep.

You can use a pie crust stamp to create designs on your dough. Look around and see what other textures you can create from things around the house. You could use glasses or bowls with a cut design on the bottom or press a doily or textured piece of fabric over the clay before you cut out the ornaments.

Let your ornaments dry for about 8-10 hours, then carefully turn and flatten (if necessary) and let dry for another 8-10 hours, then turn again. Repeat process, it will probably take about 1 1/2 – 2 days for these to dry completely. Make sure the ornaments are as flat as possible.

On these bunnies, I used alphabet stamps to stamp “HOPPY” into the clay right after I cut them out.

Once the ornaments are dry, you may want to smooth the edges and top a bit. You can do it with a small nail file, or I used a sanding block and sanding paper to make the process go faster. Then let the fun and creativity really begin.

After the ornaments were dry, I just used watercolors and applied a light coat over the smooth eggs. You can leave them with a matte finish or put a coat of satin or glossy Mod Podge. They also make Mod Podge with glitter which would be fun, I haven’t tried it. (Experiment with other paints – the watercolors were just what I had on hand.)

Little bunnies look cute when added to your Easter decorations. (Can see on the right side that I needed to flatten that bunny during the drying process?).

You can also use them to decorate packages. This bunny tail was made from the hole made by the straw.

Use a large egg cookie cutter for the outside, then use a small one to create a design on the inside. I glued a piece of yellow paper behind the ornament, but you could also just leave it open. Add stickers, little flowers or lace for decoration. I also coated the ornament with satin Mod Podge before adding the decorations. If you have animal cracker cookie cutters, it would be cute to make a set of ornaments from them for a little Easter tree.

I added the embossed hearts to these bunnies to make their little tails. I used watercolors to paint them pink. Spring raffia ribbon is so cute with these ornaments.

This bunny has a larger tail, painted with watercolor, then once that was dry, I added a layer of glue and sprinkled on some chunky glitter.

Little kids would have fun decorating these with stickers, googly eyes, washi tape, glitter and markers. You could also use these to decorate an Easter tree or just spring branches.

The little embossed sheep were my favorites! So easy and just adorable.

The embossing rolling pin makes these Easter ornaments look extra special. They look great without any extra decorations, but you can apply a layer of Mod Podge satin to give them a bit of a glow, add glitter tails, or even use paint to color them.

These bunnies have one coat of Mod Podge satin on them.

Another fun way to decorate the smooth bunnies is to use cut out small pieces of tissue paper and then use Mod Podge to attach them to the ornaments.

Have fun with the tissue paper you have on hand! Can use a planned or random design. Maybe a stained glass bunny?

These would be cute on an Easter tree or placed in vase with spring buds.

How cute would it be to add these to little packages or Easter baskets?

If you are a stamper, you can also use stamps to create designs in the clay. Slightly damped the stamp first. I used a damp paper towel and used it to blot the stamp right before stamping the clay. These could also be colored with watercolor or makers, or topped with satin Mod Podge.

Experiment with the markers you have on hand to decorate your ornaments.

I put a layer of satin Mod Podge on these to give them a finished look.

Hoppy Spring to you! Use some of your extra time at home to “play” and be creative! Have fun and Enjoy!!!!

You can get the clay, alphabet stamps and raffia from Amazon. You can find similar products at your local discount or craft stores. A Pinterest search will give you so many more ideas!

Here are ideas for Christmas ornaments.

Christmas Clay Ornaments