Wreath Waltz

Last year my living arrangements did not allow for elaborate holiday decorating. I resorted to container decorating, similar to container gardening but different. This year we have an actual house with lots of room and a magnificent fireplace to boot. Unfortunately, we do not have a normal TV like normal people. No, we watch TV projected on the wall. The wall above the fireplace that is, meaning my decorations cannot exceed three inches. I decided to spookify the entry instead.

I purchased a twig wreath to turn into a googly eyes wreath, something I found last year on one of the many creative blogs I read and have been patiently waiting to reproduce. But then I got sidetracked by another cool idea of cutting a Dollar Tree crow in half and gluing the head to sheet music in a black frame. I decided to combine the two.

I found the perfect sheet music at The Graphics Fairy, printed it out, cut it to size, and mod podged it on my round piece of wood.

The next step was breaking out a big knife and decapitating my little crow.

A generous amount of hot glue secured my bird's head to the wood which in turn was secured to the wreath with E6000 glue and black Gorilla tape.



Add a few more black birds and skulls. And spray painted Dollar Tree candle sticks for effect.

Instant spooky hallway. Kind of...

I am very pleased with my first attempt at taxidermy, if I do say so myself.

I am linking this up to:

Christmas In July

I have been walking around with an idea for Christmas ornaments since last November, but had not been able to find the time or the supplies before this week. There is a lot of Christmas in July currently going around on the web, so now that I have everything I need, including a whole day to myself, I thought I would join in on the fun.

I purchased twenty three inch long colonial chandelier crystals a few months ago.

I love the shape of them, and my idea was to decoupage vintage Christmas images behind them. Since they are quite narrow, it wasn't as easy as I had anticipated to find the right size image. Until I stumbled onto an ArtChix collage sheet at Bello Modo. Twenty long and narrow vintage images, absolutely perfect for my project.

Making the ornaments is fun and easy. Begin by cutting out the images to fit the crystals, using scissors or a paper cutter.

Apply some Perfects Pearls with a small paintbrush for a nice shimmer. It can be used wet or dry, I just dry brushed it on.

Decoupage the image to the back of the crystal, using Mod Podge or any clear drying glue. Once it has dried for about an hour, add some silver leaf to the back of the image. I used liquid silver leaf that I found at Hobby Lobby, which turned out very nice. But to be honest, I think silver paint would have been equally beautiful and much cheaper.

Apply a clear coat sealer to protect the silver leaf once that is dry. If you accidentally get some clear coat on the glass surface, don't worry, a little acetone will take it right off.

Add some string or ribbon, and you're done. Beautiful handmade ornaments that make a lovely and inexpensive Christmas gift when the time comes. I have put them all away for the next five months. Never before have I been this organized, and I am quite proud of myself.

Sunny Side Framed

I have looked everywhere in blog land but can't find the exact post that inspired me to make this year's Easter decor. Therefore I cannot credit the crafter that designed the Easter eggs I shamelessly copied. But thank you for the inspiration, whoever you are!

The Graphics Fairy is one of my favorite blogs. I keep coming back to it and every single time I find another image I would love to use in one of the many projects that live in my head. For my Easter eggs, I selected three very different but equally lovely graphics.

I copied the images into a word document where I turned them into ovals. Every picture was printed out four times. After cutting out the egg shapes, I folded them all in half and mod podged one half of one egg to one half of another egg with the same image. I repeated this step for all quarters of all images. As soon as my half eggs were dry, I glued the two halves together, making one whole.

Once my eggs were completely dry, I sealed them with two coats of Mod Podge. One coat was applied in horizontal brush strokes and one in vertical brush strokes, leaving a nice vintage looking surface texture. Word to the wise: if you use an ink jet printer like I did, the colors tend to bleed. You'll want to apply a fairly thick coat quickly to minimize the bleeding.

After letting my eggs dry overnight, I wanted to add some glitter to the sides. For two reasons: 1) my toddler and I like sparkles, and 2) to cover up the edges that showed my cutting mistakes (it did not occur to me at the time to cut off any uneven bits after the glue had dried). I experimented with real glitter but after finding little purple sparkles EVERYWHERE, I decided glitter glue was the way to go.

All that was left to do was punch a hole in each egg, string it onto some silver ribbon, and attach it to one of the three lovely wooden frames I scored at the local thrift store for $1.50. I used tape, because I want to be able to change out my decorations on a regular basis.

I am linking this up to: