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What is a sparkleball?

According to Wikipedia, it's an ornament handmade out of Christmas lights and plastic cups, using soldering, staples or cable ties to join the cups. It is a modern American folkcraft whose origins are unknown.

 

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Mechanicsville VA

Bonnie Penny made her Sparkleball Christmas Tree with 17 different sparkleballs, each wrapped in red or green netting and topped with a red velvet bow.

 

San Diego CA

Lee's mega-super-sparkleball uses 225 16 oz. cups with 1 light per cup.Her husband Len had to design an ingenious hanger (heavy wire with disk) to support the ball's weight. Want to make your own biggie? Here you go.

 

West Palm Beach FL


Annette Jones learned about sparkleballs on thriftyfun.com. For her first one, she used multi-colored zip-ties on a no-melt version. (rollover image)

Boston MA

Joey made these for a friend's Christmas party. They hung them from recessed lighting fixtures in the kitchen and living room. "Everyone I was talking to about making sparkleballs looked at me like I had two heads-- until they saw them!"

 

Anaheim CA

Mark Snow's sparkleball was a gift from a friend. It completely wiped out his "Elf Poop" holiday blues. He writes " a hand crafted gift is the essence of giving and Christmas. The fact that someone set aside their regularly scheduled life and dedicated that time to create something just for me was just awesome." (Read the full story here. )


Jefferson City MO

Andrew has made over 300 sparkleballs. Above, he uses two different strings of lights (red lights in the cups/white stuffed in the center.) After the rollover, see his unique sparkleball made of American flag cups he found in a card shop. To order a sparkleball from Andrew click here. To read more about color/patterned cups click here. [rollover image]


Nova Scotia Canada

Jean Hardy bought this sparkleball at a craft fair. It's made with small cups and the lights are completely embedded within the sparkleball, not stuck through the cup bottoms. Between every cup, somebody put a big dab of sparkle glue.

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