This was one of the last ornaments I made, and I did it because with all the ornaments I had been making, I hadn’t gotten around to a creche. I also wanted some more wood on the tree. It’s such an important material in the nativity story, and one I had been neglecting. I had some leftover wood veneer sheets from these two projects, so this was as simple as cutting out shapes and gluing them together.
The wood veneer is pretty delicate, so to make the foundation of the ornament I cut out two pieces of the creche shape and glued them together with wood glue.
I chose a different color wood for the pieces that make up the manger,
and a third color for the star. Since the veneer is fragile and loves to split on the grain, cut carefully with a pair of scissors but never snip them closed. If you do cut any little pieces off, you can always glue them back together when you assemble them on the main creche piece.
After you cut out all the pieces and glue them together, let them dry under something heavy. The wood veneer likes to curl up with moisture, so let the ornaments get really good and dry before you take them out from under your heavy objects. Use a hole punch to make room for a ribbon to hang the ornament.
