Puffy Gingerbread Ornaments Recipe for Kids

October 20, 2025
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You will love this no-fail, easy to make gingerbread ornaments! This gingerbread ornaments recipe produces beautiful gingerbread men to decorate and turn into Christmas ornaments. Make these gingerbread ornaments homemade with toddler, preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, and first grade students to celebrate the holiday season in December.

You will love this no-fail, easy to make gingerbread ornaments! This gingerbread ornaments recipe produces beautiful gingerbread men to decorate and turn into Christmas ornaments. Make these gingerbread ornaments homemade with toddler, preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, and first grade students to celebrate the holiday season in December.

gingerbread ornaments

Looking for a fun and memorable holiday activity to do with your little ones this December? You will love this no-fail, easy-to-make gingerbread ornaments recipe! These delightful gingerbread men not only taste delicious, but they also make wonderful decorations that can be hung on the tree or displayed around your home.

This recipe is perfect for toddlers, preschoolers, pre-k, kindergarten, and first grade students. It’s designed to be simple and engaging, allowing children to take part in every step of the process. From mixing the dough to cutting out their favorite gingerbread shapes, your kids will be thrilled to get their hands dirty in the kitchen. And the best part? You won’t have to worry about any complicated techniques—this recipe is foolproof, ensuring that everyone, regardless of skill level, can create beautiful ornaments that look great and fill the house with that signature gingerbread aroma.

Not only is this activity fun, but it’s also a fantastic opportunity for early childhood development. Engaging in cooking activities helps improve fine motor skills, encourages creativity, and teaches basic math concepts as children measure ingredients. Plus, this project allows for quality family time during the holiday season. You can chat about family traditions as you work together to create these festive decorations.

Once the gingerbread men are baked and cooled, let the creativity flow! Your little ones can decorate their ornaments with colorful icing, sprinkles, or any other fun toppings you have on hand. Each ornament will showcase their unique artistic flair and make for perfect keepsakes that can be cherished for years to come.

We have lots more gingerbread activities and christmas activities to choose from! Plus don’t miss gingerbread coloring pages, gingerbread slime, and free printable gingerbread man activities for preschool, and the best gingerbread cookies.

Gingerbread Dough

gingerbread ornaments recipe

Mix all ingredients including shortening, sugar, water, baking soda, molasses, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and flour. Chill the playdough for 3 hours to overnight.

Gingerbread Man Ornament

gingerbread ornament recipe

Just roll out the chilled dough on a floured surface. Use cookie cutters to make seasonal shapes.

Note: You can press red hot as buttons and raisins or peppercorns as eyes if you’d like to decorate these ornaments more “traditionally”

Make sure to make a hole at the top so you can hang up your Gingerbread men, stars, trees, bells, etc. with ornament hooks. We use a straw to poke and pull out the inside and it works great!

Bake on parchment lined baking sheets at 350 F for 20 minutes.

decorate your gingerbead ornaments with puffy paint

gingerbread ornaments homemade

Once they were cooled we used puffy paint to decorate them. This gave them a really nice polished look and was so much easier to work with than icing, paint or markers! You many also consider varnishing them for durability.

Gingerbread Ornaments

My 4 year old was so proud of our Gingerbread Ornaments. Honestly, my favorite were these trees that we just swirled the “icing” on.

Gingerbread Man Ornament

Puffy Gingerbread Ornament Recipe

Beth Gorden
If you are looking for a no fail, easy to make, puffy gingerbread ornaments recipe I’ve got you covered. This is a great recipe that will produce beautiful Christmas ornaments for kids to decorate.
5 from 5 votes
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Ingredients
  

  • 3 Tablespoons shortening crisco blue box is what we use
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 3/4 cup water
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 cup molasses
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon cloves
  • 1 teaspoon ginger
  • 3 1/2 cups flour

Instructions
 

  • Mix all ingredients together and chill dough for 3 hours to overnight. Roll out and use cookie cutters. Place on greased or parchment lined cookie sheets and bake at 350 F for 20 minutes. Allow to dry thoroughly 1-3 days before varnishing and painting.
  • These Christmas Word Searches are fun, engaging activity for kids during December. These christmas word search printable pages have varying degrees of difficulty making these holiday word search fun for children in preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, first grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, and 5th graders too. Simply print the free printable christmas word search for kids to play and learn while finding words to do with December 25th like wreath, tree, bow, sleigh, Santa, gifts, cookies, carols, and more!
  • Kids will have fun practicing math and literacy skills in December using these super cute, free twas the night before christmas worksheet pages. Use these Christmas worksheets with preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten age students filled with cute holiday clipart and practice with shapes, numbesr, patterns, letters, and more! Simply print the twas the night before christmas activity printables and you are ready to play and learn!
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  • Celebrate the holiday season this December with these super cute, free Christmas coloring pages. These simple Christmas coloring sheets are a fun, no-prep Christmas worksheet for toddler, preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, and first grade students. Kids can color the ornament, holly, wreath, stocking, candle, candy canes, present, bells, Christmas tree, and Merry Christmas greeting for a fun Christmas Activity. 
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  • These Christmas Emotions Sorting Mats are the perfect activity to get learners introduced to emotions and the different feelings that they have. This center is perfect for Christmas activities for Kindergarten, preschool to learn about the different emotions that they experience. The Emotions Sorting Game is also a great way to practice visual discrimination with your learners as they have to sort the emotions based on the different faces displayed on the objects. Simply download, print and prep the christmas printables  and let your learners have a fun and hands-on SEL activity exploring and sorting emotions!
  • Looking for a fun christmas activity that is no-prep because it uses free printable christmas worksheets? This super cute Christmas I Spy is a great way to have fun, work on visual discrimination, and work on counting too. This I spy Christmas printable is great for preschool, pre-k, kindergarten and even first grade and 2nd grdaers. Simply print free Christmas printables and you are ready to play and learn!
  • Kids are going to love these interactive, Free printable Christmas Playdough Mats! Let their creativity soar as they play, learn, and strengthen their fine motor skills while helping decorate the Christmas tree, decorating the gingerbread man, helping Santa Claus getting on his iconic red suit, and more!  Simply download the pdf file with the 10 different free Christmas playdough mats to have fun with toddler, preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten age students this December!

Christmas Printables

  • Get ready to unleash your creativity this holiday season with our Marbleized Melted Crayon Ornaments! These stunning crayon Christmas ornament craft is not only a blast for kids to make, but they also turn out absolutely gorgeous! This Christmas ornaments crafts for kids is fun for all ages—from preschool to elementary. All you need are a few simple materials and a little imagination! Grab your little ones and let the fun begin!
  • This No Stick Gingerbread Slime Recipe is not only fun to play with, but it smells amazing too!  This easy Gingerbread Slime is perfect for strengthening and engaging little hands for some sensory play in December. Make a gingerbread man out of slime, stretch, mold, oooooz and have lots of fun with this Christmas activity for kids! We love this Gingerbread activities with toddler, preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, first grade, and 2nd grade students!
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Christmas Activities

  • This magical Melting Christmas tree project is sure to bring some magic and fun into your day this holiday seasons! Try this simple, easy Christmas Science Experiments with preschoolers, kindergartners, toddlers, and grade 1 students to sneak in some fun Christmas Learning! This Chemistry Christmas tree is such a fun Christmas activity for kids to try this holiday season!
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  • If you are looking for a fun, simple way for kids to learn about the life cycle of a reindeer, then you will love these fun and free Reindeer  Worksheets.  Use these reindeer printables in December for science or anytime when learning about reindeer life cycles with elementayr age students in first grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade, and 6th graders too.
  • This fun Rudolph Race Game is both an outrageously fun Christmas game for kids and a chance to sneak in  Christmas STEM Activities! This easy-to-set-up Rudolph Races is a Christmas Activity for toddler, preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, first grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade, and 6th grade students that teaches a little physics while having FUN! This Christmas science experiment is perfect for the whole family!
  • Kids are going to flip when they make they make their own spinning Christmas tree science project. This easy electronics project is perfect for December because it combines a Christmas craft and a Christmas science experiment to make one EPIC Christmas STEM project for kinderarten, first grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade, 6th grade, 7th grade, and 8th grade students. This festive, holiday Christmas activity for kids is a must try this year!
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Christmas Science

  • Sneak in some practice telling time to the hour, half hour, quarter after, and quarter till this December with a cute time activity! This polar express activity uses no-prep telling time worksheets to make holiday math. Use these free worksheets with kindergarten, first grade, 2nd grade, and 3rd grade students. Just print the pages that your student needs to work on. 
  • FREE Christmas Dot-to-dot Coloring Pages - prek and kindergarten age kids will have fun practicing counting to 10 and 15 with these holiday math worksheets Christmas connect the dots make learning fun in december for preschoolers and kindergartners #dottodot #christmas #prek
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  • Looking for a fun way to practice 2D shapes identification and recognition? These Christmas 2D Shape Puzzles are the perfect way to practice shape recognition and identification with your learners. This hands-on activity of matching 2D shapes to complete the puzzle are such a hands-on way to get learners learning and recognizing their 2D shapes. With a fun Christmas theme, as learners recognize the shapes of the Christmas ornaments, this activity is perfect for a Kindergarten Christmas Math Center! Simple download, print and prep the printable for your learners to use over and over again for an engaging 2D shape activity!
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Math Christmas Activities

  • Are you looking for fun, playful, and educational gingerbread activities for preschoolers? Grab our free gingerbread printable set with gingerbread men each featuring a different uppercase letter along with a recording sheet to trace and write the capital letters. This letter recognition activities for preschoolers is perfect for December!
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  • Are you looking for a fun, educational Christmas activity for kindergarten? This fun long o sound printable lets children put together Christmas tree puzzles while working on long o vowel teams. Simply print and you are ready to play and learn in December.
  • This week we have dived into the vowel team with eigh sound words. And with Christmas right around the corner, I knew we needed a fun, educational Christmas game to work on our new eigh words. I hope you enjoy this free printable vowel team game as much as my first graders have.
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  • FREE Christmas Tree ABC Game - kids will have fun practicing sorting Christmas presents under the correct alphabet Christmas tree by listening for the beginning sound. Great literacy activity for prek, kindergarten and first grade for some fun Christmas learning or center in December #christmasphonics #christmaskindergarten #christmasprintable
  • Help children practice their alphabet letters with these super cute, and FREE polar express worksheets. These polar express printables allow preschool, pre-k, and kindergarten to  practicing to identify both uppercase and lowercase letters with a festive letter find activity perfect for December. These fun, educational Christmas worksheets are a fun, engaging way to work on letter recognition this holiday season.
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  • If you are looking for some fun ideas to get your child writing more during the month of December? You will love these free printable Christmas Writing Prompts for kindergarten, first grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, and 4th grade students.  There are over 30 pages of December writing prompts, letters to Santa templates, and more with both smaller and wider ruled lines! 

Language Arts Christmas Activities

Beth Gorden is the creative multi-tasking creator of 123 Homeschool 4 Me. As a busy homeschooling mother of six, she strives to create hands-on learning activities and worksheets that kids will love to make learning FUN! With over 20 years educating children, she has created over 1 million pages of printables to help teach kids alphabet, math, science, English grammar, history, and so much more! Beth is also the creator of 2 additional sites with even more educational activities and FREE printables - www.kindergartenworksheetsandgames.com and www.preschoolplayandlearn.com. Beth studied at the University of Northwestern where she got a double major to make her effective at teaching children while making education FUN!

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5 from 5 votes

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Recipe Rating




5 Comments

  1. 5 stars
    These were so easy to make and turned out perfectly, thanks!

    Reply

  2. 5 stars
    These smelled so good as we made our sweet gingerbread men! Love it

    Reply

  3. 5 stars
    Just what I was looking for, thanks

    Reply

  4. 5 stars
    We made a whole crew of gingerbread men and turned them into pirates with wooden peg legs to go along with the christmas pirates book. It was a huge hit and this recipe was perfect. Thanks

    Reply

  5. 5 stars
    We made these years ago and they are still hanging on our christmas tree bringing back sweet memories

    Reply