Remembering Jessica: creating a special angel for the top of our Christmas tree

For the last few years we’ve had a star at the top of our tree. This year though, our tree will be topped with a very special angel – our little heart angel Jessica who died in April. Last year Jessica enjoyed helping me make figures for a shoebox Nativity using polystyrene balls and paper cups. This year, I used them to make a model of her for our Christmas tree.

 

 

Our little angel tree topper is simple to make. If you would like to make one for your own Christmas tree, here is how we made ours:

 

You will need:

• A polystyrene ball
• Flesh coloured paint
• Paintbrush
• Blu tack
• A cocktail stick
• Marker pens
• A paper cup
• PVA glue
• White crepe paper or tissue paper
• White webbed fabric
• A small paper doily (optional)
• Hot glue
• Silver card
• Paper
• Pencil
• Scissors
• White craft foam
• Pink felt or craft foam
• Cardboard
• Brown embroidery thread or wool
• White embroidery thread or wool (optional)
• A sparkly gold pipe cleaner

 

1) Paint the polystyrene ball with flesh coloured paint. We pushed a cocktail stick into the bottom of the ball and stuck the other end of the stick into some blu tack to hold it upright which made it easier to paint. Leave to dry. Repeat with extra coats as needed.

 

 

 

2) Draw a face on the polystyrene ball using marker pens.

 

 

 

3) Turn a paper cup over so the base is uppermost. Cover in PVA glue and wrap white crepe paper or tissue paper around it. Repeat to add extra layers as needed.

 

 

 

4) Spread another layer of PVA glue on the cup and wrap some white webbed fabric around it. Leave to dry.

 

 

 

5) If your cup has a recessed base like ours did, you may wish to fill it in by gluing scrunched up tissue to the base and then gluing a small paper doily on top.

 

 

 

6) Cut two pieces of silver card and glue together with the shiny sides facing outwards. Leave to dry.

 

7) Cut out two arm shapes from white craft foam and two hand shapes from pink felt or craft foam. Glue the hands on to the arms and leave to dry.

 

 

 

8) Draw the outline of a pair of angel wings on a piece of paper and cut out. Use this template to draw angel wings on to the silver card and cut out.

 

 

 

9) Glue the polystyrene ball to the cup using hot glue.

 

10) Attach the angel wings to the back of the cup using hot glue. Glue one arm on each side.

 

 

 

11) Cut a piece of cardboard approx. 15cm long. Wrap brown embroidery thread around the cardboard. Cut at the top and bottom to create 15cm long strands of embroidery thread.

 

 

 

12) Spread glue over the top and back of the polystyrene ball head and stick on the embroidery thread to make the angel’s hair. Trim the ends if needed. You can use the trimmings to create a fringe if required. Leave to dry.

 

 

 

13) Make a halo by twisting a gold pipe cleaner into a circle and leaving a short stem at the back. Glue to the back of the polystyrene ball using hot glue.

 

 

 

14) (Optional) We plaited our angel’s hair and tied it with white embroidery thread bows. Jessica often wore her hair in two plaits.

 

 

Your angel is now finished and ready to go on top of your Christmas tree!

 

Christmas will be hard this year without our beautiful angel with us. Having a little model of her looking over us from our Christmas tree is one way for us to help make her a part of our Christmas.