Simple Christmas Craft: Miniature Nativity

One year, I got inspired to do Christmas crafts. My craft of choice: sew stockings. Forget that I’d never sewed in my life. It was Christmas and I felt obligated to do a Christmas craft. It didn’t go well. My material was crooked, the sewing machine jammed, I threaded the bobbin wrong and couldn’t sew a strait line to save my life. The project ended with me tired, in tears and vowing to never  do another Christmas craft. Fast forward several years. I saw this tiny nativity and wanted one so badly. I decided to dust off my craft table and give it a go. To my great joy, I did this with zero sewing and minimal cutting. If you can paint and hot glue, you’re golden. This took away my Christmas craft nightmares.

If you’re exceptionally handy you can cut wood to the exact size you want it. The best part about this craft is; there are no set dimensions. Just use what you have or can find.

For the bodies of Mary and Joseph, I just picked up a package of wood pieces from Hobby Lobby. If we were handy people, we probably would have had scrap wood rectangles around the house to use. As it is, we’re not handy people, so I went this route.

For their heads, I used these 1 3/4″ craft knobs.

Baby Jesus was just a rectangular wood piece and a craft furniture knob.

Start by gathering all your wood pieces together to paint. Use creative license here. I always see pictures of Mary wearing a blue robe and Joseph wearing brown. That’s why I went with these colors. But feel free to use the colors that say “Christmas” to you.

I used a plain peach for all three head pieces and white for Baby Jesus’ blanket piece. For the heads, I set them on a paintbrush to be able to paint them from all angles.

This is completely optional but I chose to use a crackle paint over the body pieces (everything but the heads) to give it a bit more character. The crackle is subtle but I think it really adds to the character.

Now assemble. All the assembly is done with hot glue. First, attach all the head pieces. Mary and Joseph each get a large knob on top and assemble Baby Jesus by gluing the knob in the top center of the white rectangle.

Next, glue on Mary’s hood. I just used a piece of burlap ribbon for this. Wrap it around her head and glue it to the top, center of her body, right below her head piece. Then fold the “wings” over in the back and glue them down.

Then attach Mary and Joseph together with a generous amount of glue between the two bodies.

After you’re confident Mary and Joseph are securely attached, Attach Baby Jesus to Mary and Joseph at a diagonal.

To finish it off, tie all three together with a piece of twine attached with a dot of glue in the front.

I promise you can do this. These make great gifts, though I had to keep one for myself as well because they’re so cute. I made three during a movie, so in about two hours.

Good luck in all your Christmas crafting endeavors and if you choose to sew, may the odds be ever in your favor.