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Hi everyone! It’s such an honor to be guest posting here at Design Dazzle! My name is Janet and I blog over at Today’s Fabulous Finds. I just finished my very first Christmas craft of the season: A Childrens’ Nativity Set made with craft sticks and clay pots. I’m so excited to show you how to make one for your own family or to give away as a gift!




1. Using a pair of wire cutters, cut two paint sticks in half. Pinch the stick tightly with the wire cutters and then carefully break it off in two or one side may just flip across the room. Yes, we know from experience. 🙂 Cut one-fourth of the length off of 4 more paint sticks. The rest of the sticks used will be full-size.
2. Lay out two sets of four sticks. Hot glue the half-size sticks to the top and bottom. Lay out 9 sticks, glue a full-size stick to the top and bottom.
3. Glue the X on. (You may want to wait to do this step until after your stain/paint the back piece.)
4. Glue the three wall pieces together as pictured above.
5. Lay out two sets of seven sticks. (Leave a small space between two of them to string the wire through for the star.) Glue a stick across, one inch up from the bottom. Glue another stick across at the top so it hangs over the top of the sticks by 1/8″ (this will be the peak of the roof).
6. Glue the two parts of the roof together in the center. Use plenty of hot glue. Hold the two pieces in place on the sides of the stable and at the angle you want the roof as the glue dries.

7. Use a rag to stain the craft sticks and the star or paint them dark brown with craft paint and a brush. Let dry. With the rag, gently rub some cream or gray paint over the stain to give it a weathered look. Blend it in with a clean part of the rag as you go.
8. Glue the roof in place on the side walls. Lay out sheet moss on the roof, glue in place, and then roughly trim the edges with scissors.
9. For the star: Paint over the stain with gold paint. Sand to distress. Ink around the edges with a distress ink pad if necessary. Cut a piece of wire, thread it through the roof. Curl the end and hot glue it to the underside of the roof. Curl the top of the wire around a pencil and hot glue the star to the wire.


Supplies Needed





As you can see, this nativity set is not too hard to make. My daughter made the stable pictured below almost all on her own. She painted it a dark brown instead of staining it. Paint made the clean-up a lot easier, as you can imagine. 🙂

If you’re looking for an activity that will entertain your kids/grand kids, I suggest buying a large box of craft sticks. Pictured below are a few of the things my kids have made 100% on their own, without any help. It’s amazing the creativity that can come from a pile of craft sticks, a hot glue gun, and a little paint. It’s so much fun!


Have a wonderful Holiday season! Thanks for having me over Toni!


Quite possibly the cutest christmas nativity I have seen! Love it!
dazie
x
Very cute 🙂
Какие очаровательные!!!
Love this!
Janet – this is so CUTE!
Thanks for making and sharing such a darling nativity set!
Thanks for inviting me to guest post. 🙂 I'm looking forward to seeing the wonderful ideas ahead!
So cute! LOve this!
janet, this is such an adorable nativity! just love it! thanks for sharing the tutorial:)
This is adorable1 What a great idea to do with the kids:) Thanks so much for sharing Janet!!
That is so cute! Very detailed tutorial 🙂
This is adorable! Very creative 🙂 Thanks for breaking down the steps and making it look easy. I'm pretty sure I can't make it look that nice. Hehe.
So cute! I love this! Off to Pin it right now. =)
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Adorable!!!
Just letting you know that I linked to this post on my page called Nativity Activities for Kids: https://www.zujava.com/nativity-activities-for-kids
i love this craft! and it’s perfect my 4th grade sunday school students. to make it cleaner and quicker in the classroom (and more affordable), would I be able to use magic markers to color the wood instead of paint? i know it won’t be as authentic, but i’m hoping it will be a comparable substitute. let me know what you think!
It’s an awesome piece.