Cinnamon Dough Ornaments Recipe

Make applesauce & cinnamon dough ornaments for your Christmas tree with this easy recipe. Plus, download free templates to make heart, star, dove, and tree-shaped ornaments

Cinnamon dough ornaments are a wonderful way to decorate a tree and they make lovely gifts - I gave some to my sister-in-law last Christmas. With only applesauce and cinnamon as ingredients, they also smell delicious... but don't eat them! They're for decoration only. In fact, they'll last for years.

Click here to download my free ornament templates (pdf format)

Cinnamon Ornament Dough Ingredients

This is the cinnamon ornament recipe that's worked best for me:

• 1 cup applesauce
• 1 3/4 (one and three-quarter) cups powdered cinnamon

Other recipes suggest equal amounts of applesauce and cinnamon, but when I tried that the dough turned out way too runny, and I had to keep adding more and more cinnamon until I got the right texture.

Cinnamon Dough Ornaments Instructions

Step 1 - Knead

Mix the cinnamon and applesauce together in a large bowl, and knead into a dough with your hands. Your Christmas ornament dough should feel like warm plasticine. If it's too runny, add more cinnamon. If it's too dry, add more applesauce.

Step 2 - Roll

Sprinkle a bit of cinnamon onto your benchtop and rolling pin to make them "non-stick", then roll out the dough into a sheet about ¼" (0.5 cm) thick.

Step 3 - Cut

Cut out shapes from the dough with cookie cutters...

...or download my free pdf templates and trace around them with a knife:

Punch a hole near the top of the ornament using a straw or a rolled-up piece of paper:

Repeat for the rest of your ornaments. Keep re-rolling any leftover dough and making more ornaments until it's all used up. You'll be surprised how many you can make from just one batch of dough!

Step 4 - Dry

Fast method: Put the ornaments on a cookie tray lined with baking paper, and bake them in the oven at 200°F (90°C) for 2 hours, flipping once.

No-bake method: Lay your ornaments out on some kitchen towel to dry. Keep them in a warm room, and turn them over every few hours to stop them warping too much. (They always warp a little bit but it doesn't matter.) I put mine near the radiator and they dried completely within 24 hours.

Once they're dry, the ornaments are surprisingly strong. With only applesauce as binder you'd think they'd be brittle, but they're actually pretty tough, and I've never broken one by accident.

Step 5 - Decorate (optional)

If you like, you can sparkle up your ornaments with glitter. I used some glitter pens I got from a discount store.

Finished!

How did your cinnamon dough ornaments turn out? I hope you found these instructions helpful! If you have any questions or comments, or just want to say hi, please contact me with this handy form.

What Next?

Check the other homemade ornament tutorials on my Homemade Christmas Gifts page.

Happy Gifting!