Christmas Pudding Tree Decoration

youmagine

To create this masterpiece, print: 1 x "main" icing, 1 x "top" icing, 1 x Pudding, 1 x Berries, and 3 x Leaves. The berries and leaves on top of the pudding are optional but add a professional touch by concealing any joins between parts. Without them, it may appear unfinished. Clean up all parts with a craft knife to remove excess strings or lumps. You can also use sandpaper to smooth out the wavy edge of the main icing part, creating a seamless look when set against the dark pudding color. The two icing parts stick together using tiny drops of super glue. Align the top icing as closely as possible on the main icing to minimize visible joins. Next, prepare the berries and leaves by printing them in advance. The leaves feature a flat bottom and slightly curved top with a recessed area at their "fattest" end. Berries are small and printed on thin rings, which can be fragile but also bendable. To assemble the structure, glue the leaves onto the berry ring (top-side down), ensuring the recess aligns with the ring. Apply a tiny amount of super glue to the ring, allowing the leaf to stick without "glooping" or adhering to other parts. Adjust the leaf angle by laying it on top of the icing until the glue sets. This process requires patience, but once complete, the berries and leaves form a solid structure with a small hole in the center for string passage. Now, tie decorative string or narrow ribbon into a loop and hook it around the arrow shape in the pudding's flat part. Add another knot above the hook to prevent the string from coming loose later. The icing has a small hole at its top, large enough for threading a thin ribbon using a straightened paper clip. If the hole is too small, use a craft knife or drill to open it up. Thread the pudding-string assembly through the underside of the icing, ensuring the parts interlock nicely. Optional glue application at this point can reinforce the bond. Finally, carefully thread the berries/leaves assembly onto the string and push it down until it sits directly on the icing, taking care not to break any leaves from the berries. Congratulations! You've successfully created a Christmas pudding using your 3D printer! I recommend printing each part in high-quality settings for optimal results. On my machine, the icing parts took about 90 minutes to print in high quality, while berries and leaves took only a few minutes each. The pudding part takes around an hour in normal quality, but I use Cura's "skin" option to enhance its appearance. You can also use high-quality settings for the pudding, but it may take over two hours to print. To simplify the process, start with light-colored filament and work towards darker shades, as multiple color changes are required. Avoiding dark patches in white icing is a good idea. The pudding part is hollow, so infill settings aren't crucial (true for all parts). I used PLA for all parts. If you'd like to create derivatives, I've included the Sketchup source files. You might consider scaling up berries and leaves to make them less fiddly; it's possible to do this directly with STL files, but I'm unsure.