Tree Ornament Idea #3: Glittery Candle Pins

 These candles were a bit of a fluke . . . I had bought some doll pins with the purpose of making some angel ornaments, but I wasn’t really convinced with the idea. My thoughts kept going back to those Victorian Christmas trees with real candles. I know, a total fire hazard but so pretty! That’s when it dawned on me to make faux candles with the pins! Because they’re pins, they easily attach to any tree stem and they give the tree a retro spin plus there’s no worries of burning down your tree!

Supplies:  1- fine point paintbrush and large paintbrush  2- doll pins  3- acrylic paint in assorted colors 4- metallic or glittered acrylic paint  5- assortment of thin ribbon (ric rac, tiny pom pom trim, glitter ribbon)  6- flame template             7-  white and light orange felt pieces  8- needle/ white and light orange embroidery floss/ white twine  9- course crystal glitter  10- decoupage glue       11- glue gun   12- gloss varnish

Step 1 -3: Create the illusion of wax drippings by drawing right below the pin’s neck irregular waves. Use white acrylic paint and your fine tip brush to fill in the top part of the pin and pick a metallic or glitter acrylic for the base or bottom part of the pin. I chose silver metallic and red matte colors which worked really well. Make sure to apply at least 3 coats of paint to both top and bottom areas. Let dry 10 minutes in between coats.  

Steps 4-6: Apply a medium layer of decoupage glue to the white part of your candle and sprinkle a generous amount of glitter. Since this glue tends to dry quickly, it’s best to glue and glitter in parts rather than all at once. Let dry for at least 20 min. and shake off any excess glitter. To seal and protect the bottom color of your candles, apply at least 2 coats of gloss varnish and let dry for 15 min. Time to trim your candles! Cut assorted ribbon pieces (contrasting colors work best!) that wind completely around the candle’s base. I used two strips of trim per candle. Glue gun into place. 

Step 7-8: Now to make the wick and flame of your candle! For the candle wicks, cut small bits of twine. In order for these twine wicks to hold up the flame, reinforce the wicks by coating them with tacky glue and let dry. Now whip up your flames. Draw a flame on cardstock to make a template, then trace and  2 flames from white felt and cut free-hand two tear drop shapes from the orange felt (2 flames/ 2 orange droplets per candle). Assemble your flame: using orange embroidery thread, stitch the droplet to the felt flame (see pic), glue gun the wick’s tip to the inside of the flame (the wrong side). Attach both flame felt pieces together with a blanket stitch. Finally, glue the flames to the top your candles. 

Yay, you’re done! Now it’s time to pin your candles to the tree and admire they’re glittery goodness, well that’s what I normally do! Hope you’ve enjoyed these ornament tutorial posts. I had loads of fun making them for you! Now on to bigger things . . . holiday shopping, eeek! Sue

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Tree Ornament Idea #2 – A Happy Snowman!

While decorating my tree, I knew I had to make some snowmen, but I had no idea how to go about making them. After much thought, I took out an unopened block of paperclay which I had bought a while back and got to work. I absolutely love how they came out and thought it would be nice to share these ornaments with you!

Supplies
1- large paint brush   2- white and orange acrylic paint   3- wire tinsel ribbon  4- embroidery thread in red and black and needle  5- white glitter pom poms, miniature black pom poms or tiny black buttons, and small red sequins  6- black felt/ red crushed velvet fabric  7- white coarse glitter  8-  decoupage glue  9- gloss sealer  10- glue gun  11 -paper clay            12- scissors

Step 1 – A block of paper clay will yield 6 snowman heads including their noses. Cut the block into 6 even pieces (separating a small piece for the nose). Wet your hands and knead the clay first, then mold into balls. Wet your hands as much as you need to achieve smooth and well-rounded balls(*).  Mold your smaller pieces into cones (your carrots!) and attach them to the heads. It’s important that both pieces are wet, especially the base of your cone since the moisture will help glue both pieces together. Add texture to your carrot by etching lines on its surface with a needle. Set your heads aside and let them air dry for a full day. *Note: Make sure that you knead your clay with enough water, if not the clay will tend to crack upon drying.

Step 2 – Once your snomen heads are completely dry, apply at least 2-3 coats of white acrylic to each head and orange acrylic to each nose (let dry 15 min. between each coat). Now comes the fun part, apply a thin layer of glue to your snowman’s head only (not the nose) and sprinkle a generous amount of glitter. Do the same with the rest and shake off the excess glitter; set your snowman aside to dry for at least 30 min. To avoid chipping from the snowman’s nose, I sealed the color using a gloss varnish.  For the eyes I used mini black pom poms (tiny buttons work great too), and then attach them with a glue gun. Finally, create a happy smile for your snowman by cutting about .5″ piece of black embroidery floss, cover the thread entirely with decoupage glue and shape it into a smile directly on the face. Let dry. 

Step 3 – To make a top hat, cut two circles (1.5″ wide and 3/4″ wide) and  1″ h x 2.25″ l rectangle. Assemble the hat (you can use felt glue or stitch it together). Grab a bit of green felt and create holly leaves using pinking shears. Add a red sequin to the leaves and glue gun it to the hat.   

Step 4 – To make a santa hat, cut out a triangle (sides are approx. 3.5″ while base is 4″ long) from some red velvet fabric. Sew, stitch or glue the right sides together.

Step 5 – Turn the santa hat inside out and cut about 3.75″ of tinsel wire ribbon. Starting from the back of the hat (where the seam is), glue-gun the ribbon to the outer edge of the hat, then glue a glitter pom pom to the hat’s tip. 

Step 6 – Still with me? Good, because that means you’re almost done! The last thing you need to do is add a hanging string to your snowman. Cut some red embroidery floss (7″ long),  and thread your needle with it (do not knot!). Create a loop that emerges from the outside of your snowman hat by taking your needle to the seam at the back of your santa hat(*), bring it through the inside of the hat and then rethread the needle with the other end of the thread and do the same. Both thread ends will now be inside the hat. Tie the ends together into a tight knot. Glue the knot to the top of the snowman’s head, along with the hat. *For the top hat, take the needle through the top!

Pull the loop of the string and your snowman is ready hang on your tree! I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and give it a go with your own cute snowmen ornaments. If you have any questions about this tute, please don’t hesitate to ask! Talk soon, Sue

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Tree Ornament Idea #1 – Holly Embellishments

I love holly and thought it would look great on my tree. Here’s a quick and easy way of making your own holly!

Materials:
– white felt (or the color of your choice)
– ribbon/ ric rac
– glitter pom poms
– glue gun
– scissors
– holly pattern

Step 1 – Trace your holly pattern on to your felt. You can easily find a holly pattern on-line. I like create a template on cardstock, so I can use in the future. My holly leaves measure between 2″ to 3″ long.

Step 2 – Cut out all your holly leaves.

Step 3 – Cut out ribbon pieces that are as long as each holly leaf. I chose ribbon with bits of green and red ric rac for mine.

Step 4 – For this part, I sewed the ribbon to my holly leaves, but if you don’t have a sewing machine you can either stitch it on or use a glue gun.

Step 5 – Assemble your holly, overlay each of the 3 leaves glue-gunning as you go. Glue on the glitter pom poms and you’ve created . . .

the prettiest holly embellishments ever! Add a string to the back of the middle leaf and you have an ornament. You can also attach them to twine and make a super cute garland! Sue

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Coasting into November!

Although I’m a bit bummed that Halloween is over, I’m still looking forward to Thanksgiving and continuing my fall-themed projects. Today I worked on some pretty fabric coasters. Like my fall pumpkins and garland, I’m sticking to easy sewing projects.

Nothing like instant “craft”ification (sorry, I couldn’t help myself!). I’ve got a lot of fabric scraps leftover, so I’m thinking about a quilted runner. I’ll keep you posted. Sue

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Hello All Hallows Eve!

It’s fall . . . it’s mid-October . . . Halloween is right around the corner . . . Yay! I always get excited when October comes. There’s something about the month and the count down to Halloween that makes me reminisce on the days when my mom would ask my sister and I what we wanted to be for Halloween, so she could gather supplies and fabric to sew up our costumes. She’d start right at the beginning of the month and she would show us her progress. I think I love Halloween over any other holiday because of my mom. She would go all out and have my sis and I decorate the house with spooky cats, skeletons, witches. Every year, she’d buy a pumpkin and carve it, letting my sister gut the pumpkin and me insert the candle. She’d light it and we’d place on our front porch and relish the work we’d done. What great memories! Thanks mom!
But I digress, the point of this post, besides sharing a tidbit of my childhood, is to share the wonderful Halloween crafts that I’ve found on Flickr. Here are some great DIYs and inspiring Halloween decor. Enjoy!

pretty Halloween yarn wreath by polkadotbug

cute bats by gleeful things

Halloween bunting by Pretty Ditty

Halloween Luminaries by Gleeful things

sweet little ghosts from MerryMayHandmade

*Note: all pictures are linked to their original authors, just click on the pic for the link!

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DIY – Crochet Tree Ornaments

Today I started working on my gift list. As I made these cute ornaments, I decided to turn my project into quick tute you can follow as well. These little ornaments can be made in your choice of colors and can also be made into a garland. Keep in mind that this DIY does require beginner crochet skills. Enjoy!

Supplies:
1. yarn – whitefor the triangles, 3 contrasting colors for the braid 2. gray embroidery thread
3. scissors 4. pushpin 5. yarn needle 6. embroidery needle 7. silver glitter 8. cardstock 9. glue

Crochet 5 single crochet triangles.

Using the contrasting colored yarns, weave a 25″ long braid. Tie a knot to only one end of the braid.

This take a little patience, but thread the open-ended braid (the end that wasn’t knotted) through the yarn needle. Run the braid close to the top of your crochet triangle. Weave through the triangle in a zig-zag pattern. Make sure to leave a 5″ tail, so you can make a loop to hang your ornament.

Cut some mini triangles from cardstock and paste them to form stars. Once they’re dry, apply a thin coat of glue to each star’s surface and generously sprinkle glitter onto the stars until they turned into glitter hillets. I let them sit there for a bit and then removed the excess glitter. With a pushpin, I poked two holes in the center of each star.

Loop the braid’s tail end and hide it to the back of the triangle. Sew the stars to the top of each traingle with the embroidery thread, making sure to stitch in place the end of the braided tail.

And that’s it! A super cute gift that’s simple and quick to make!

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Tree Trimmings!

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. The trip to Fort Myers was wonderful since I got to spend some long, overdue time with my family. Since I’ve come back from my trip, I’ve been working on revamping the decor of my tiny tree.

Last night I was busy making pom poms (24 to be exact!).

Then, I braided yarn of the same color scheme as my pom poms.

 

Finally, using a yarn needle I stringed my pom poms onto my braided rope (think popcorn on a string!) and made my mini garland.

Now all I need is a tree topper. Any DIY ideas? Hope your Sunday is going great! Sue

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