Christmas Ornament 3-D Puzzle

This is a fun little puzzle that fits into a 5-1/4" square of 1/8" MDF. Little gaps in each pieces pattern allow them to stay attached to the square until you break them free. It then can be built into a Christmas ornament. These are easy to decorate with paints, crayons, felt pens/  It is quick, easy and inexpensive to make that required no packaging. The pattern (included) can be edited to work with most any size laser. They sell well at craft fairs.

Each ornament blank is 5-1/4" square. The pattern has an array of 3 x 3 ornaments. thstcan be cut on a piece of 1/8" 16" x 16" MDF. What is nice is that it is a good project to use your pieces of scrap.  Load the pattern (Included (SVG) and edit it for the number of scorpions for the size of your piece of MDF.

Snap the three pieces out of their blank. Insert the small piece into the side piece with no holder on top. (1st figure). Then inset that piece with the holder. (2nd photo0. Then take 12" of string, wire, or fishing line to place a loop in the hole in the holder.

You can decorate the pieces either before you assemble them, after you assemble them, or both.

My cost for a 16" square of 1/8" MDF is about a dollar. I can make 9 of these ornaments with this square for a material cost of 11 cents each. My laser is an 80watt OMTech and ittakes 11 minutes to cut out a sheet or about 1-1/4 minutes each. My laser cost about $6000 to buy and install and I believe it has a life time of 3000 hours or $2 per hour. I set a use rate of $6 per hour or 10 cents per unit. I do not charge for my time when it operates because I am off doing other things. I do charge for my load and unload time which is 10 seconds.  My shop rate is $36 dollar. per hr which come out to a dime. So my total cost is about 35 cents. This neglects the cost of sales. I use these as loss leader at craft shows and give them to kids to decorate, I have a small card table set up with felt pens and spray glitter and let the kids go nuts. (Adults pay $1.) This will become a generational thing and people will make visiting your booth an annual Christmas tradition.