Recommended winter wall decorations for seniors: heartwarming ideas
During the persistently cold winter, many older adults tend to spend more time indoors.
Winter is full of enjoyable events and festivities, such as Christmas, New Year’s, and Setsubun.
Let’s help older adults feel the season even while indoors with winter-themed wall decorations!
In addition to winter events and traditions, there are also decorations inspired by flowers that are at their best during this time of year.
Craft activities that use fine motor skills can help prevent dementia and are also recommended as a communication tool.
Enjoy creating together and have a wonderful time.
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[For Seniors] Recommended Winter Wall Decorations: Heartwarming Ideas (41–50)
ball ornament
Here’s an introduction to making a cute spherical ornament out of felt.
First, create a circular template and use it to cut out circles from felt.
Cut five pieces each in two colors, such as red and green, then cut them in half and glue them together with a hot glue gun.
Be careful not to burn yourself, as the glue gun gets very hot.
After making two half-spheres, attach a bell with a thread to the bottom, and a ribbon with a pearl bead to the top.
That’s it! Simply by changing the colors, you can create ornaments with either a Western or Japanese feel—aren’t they lovely?
[For Seniors] Recommended Winter Wall Decorations: Heartwarming Ideas (51–60)
Felt ema (votive plaque)
This project involves attaching decorations—such as zodiac animals and lucky charms made of felt—onto a felt base shaped like an ema plaque.
While ema are typically thought of as flat, using felt for both the base and the decorations creates a soft, three-dimensional effect.
A key point is to finish the decorations with a soft feel by adding stuffing inside or layering pieces when gluing them on.
If making each decoration from scratch is challenging, another recommended approach is to prepare the parts in advance and have participants arrange them to create their own design.
cardboard ema (votive tablet)
Cut cardboard into the shape of ema (votive plaques), then decorate them with New Year–themed illustrations such as the zodiac animals and with each person’s wishes.
By making use of the cardboard’s natural brown color, you can evoke the soft, wooden feel of real ema.
You can certainly have everyone draw their own design on the front, but if you prepare illustrations in advance and let participants choose from them, they can focus more on thinking about their wishes and writing the text.
Selecting an illustration that perfectly matches each wish is another enjoyable part of the process.
A demon made by winding yarn
Here’s a simple craft idea for making an oni (ogre) decoration.
Cut cardboard into a square and create the oni’s face.
Wrap the cut cardboard with yarn in colors you like, such as blue or red.
Attach the facial features, and your oni is complete.
You can display it on a decorative fan base for a festive look, or mount it on construction paper or colored paper for a lovely finish.
To give it a Setsubun feel, arrange holly leaves or plum blossoms around the oni to create a lively atmosphere.
It’s also fun to make several Setsubun-themed parts together with older adults.
You can prepare the parts in advance, let the seniors choose the pieces, and have them finish the work in their preferred style.
Mini shikishi decorations for Setsubun from the 100-yen shop
This is a wall decoration themed around the oni (ogres) that appear in Setsubun, a traditional Japanese seasonal event.
Why not make a seasonal decoration using items you can buy at a 100-yen shop? Create the oni’s facial parts from construction paper and attach a soft string to both sides of the assembled face.
Represent the beans using Lezac paper or colored paper, adhere them to mini square boards, then use double-sided tape to add the oni parts as decorations.
Scatter beans and other elements used in oni-chasing scenes across the boards, attach a ribbon at the top, and it’s complete.
Working on these detailed steps also helps train fine motor skills by engaging your fingertips.
Bunny Wreath
One animal that suits winter well might be the rabbit.
Its fluffy white fur is like snow and matches the season perfectly.
How about making a rabbit wreath using pom-poms made from yarn? Use a pom-pom maker sold at 100-yen shops to wrap the yarn and create fluffy balls.
Since wrapping the yarn uses fine motor skills, it’s also great for rehabilitation.
Once the balls are ready, attach ears made from precut fabric and felt.
Finish by gluing on ten rabbit heads with a hot glue gun.
New Year’s shimenawa wreath
Let’s make a festive shimenawa, an essential New Year’s decoration, using easy-to-find materials.
Crumple up some newspaper, twist it into a coil, and shape it into a circle to use as the base.
Wrap the base with crepe paper and glue it in place, then attach lucky-looking parts you’ve made separately—such as a fan and camellia flowers—to finish.
Because the steps are simple, it’s a craft that lets you come up with your own design, from the colors you choose to the decorations you include.