Showing posts with label
Christmas
Fun fun!! Christmas trees are my most favorite part of the season! I'm crazy about them and even more crazy about decorating them. I have three...I'm so excited to share:
The sun room tree.
Since its where my dog Sherlock spends most of his time, the tree is decorated with cookies shaped like him and they're covered in GLITTER! Its also a tree that 's prone to drying out with the sun beating on it, so I need to keep up with the watering...I get really lazy about watering in a few weeks!
At night the lights reflect off the windows. It looks like there are thousands of lights.
The sun room tree.Since its where my dog Sherlock spends most of his time, the tree is decorated with cookies shaped like him and they're covered in GLITTER! Its also a tree that 's prone to drying out with the sun beating on it, so I need to keep up with the watering...I get really lazy about watering in a few weeks!
At night the lights reflect off the windows. It looks like there are thousands of lights.
Living room tree
This is the tree that's way too big! I got seriously carried away this year after a few years of coming home with trees that I thought could be bigger. It's fat too, but it's fine with me. I don't have tree size, thickness and shape favorites...I like them all.
Here it is in the day... yes that's tinsel and those are multi-colored lights. I know the majority favors white lights and tinsel is a tad...tacky, but I like both of those things. They're nostalgic, shimmery and lovely and remind me of those Christmas movies from the 40's when everyone was dressed up and their trees were dripping in tinsel, garland, pastel and jewel colors.
Some of the glass ornaments I've been collecting for years and that I obviously jam my trees with:
Charlie Brown tree in the bedroom.
Small white pines are wispy and delicate and they just look so darn cute decorated. I have birds, starfish and silver leaves on mine.
The branches on these trees aren't very strong so the ornaments have to be fairly light weight.
Every year, the weekend after Thanksgiving, we go hunting...for the perfect Christmas tree! It's a family affair for us and we get a good group going every year. The morning usually starts with hot chocolate, hot cider and doughnuts in the parking lot. After, its brunch with mimosas and bloody Marys. This year we went to Crane Neck farm in West Newbury http://www.cranenecktree.com/.
I think I got carried away ...the tree I chose for the living room is so huge that I feel like a squirrel when I'm in there! 
This will be my last paper cut out project for awhile...I'm getting blisters and paper cuts! These come from a Martha Stewart template found here: template. But I did a few things differently. I made them as ornaments years ago (the template size), but this year, I wanted to make larger buildings to put on a table. I enlarged the templates on the copier. I also cut a hole at the bottom so I could insert lights and covered the windows with colored sheet plastic (found at the craft store). For this project, I used heavy weight white poster board instead of cardboard. It was much easier to cut and I avoided the whole priming and painting bit.
A few tips: The dotted lines on the template are meant to be lightly scored and folded/bent, not cut. Use hot glue to assemble. Cut a base out of poster board to attach the house or church to. If you intend to light your building, cut a hole on the bottom of the base. Attach window covering with hot glue on the inside of the house pieces before assembling. You could keep these houses/churches "naked", you can see in the corner picture below they look pretty cool like that, but I obviously encrusted mine with snowy glitter. As I always say, you can never have too much glitter! Actually, I never say that, I'm kidding and wondering if anyone actually reads this! If you want to glitter yours, paint on craft glue and sprinkle with glitter.
A Christmas project finally! I love doing projects like this because I don't have much patience and this can be done in less then an hour. Well, the "Merry" can be anyway...I wasn't feeling ambitious enough to do "Christmas"! If you have less patience try "Joy"!
For this project you'll need:
-Drinking glasses (# varies depending on your word or phrase). The glasses should be straight from top to bottom and not tapered.
-Craft Paper (I used a silvery white paper with a sheen to it so it would look as interesting in the day as it does at night). Craft papers come in so may different styles. A foil would be dramatic, a birch or wood grain paper would be more rustic. One tip though, the paper should be opaque so the light shines through the letter cutout and not through the paper as a whole.
-Scissors.
-Exacto knife.
-Double sided tape.
-Printed letters from the computer, enlarged to fit the size of your glass. Choose a font you like but don't get too fancy, chunky fonts are easier to cut out.
Instructions: Cut craft paper to fit around your glass. As shown below, tape printed letter to the craft paper (remember to tape the letter to the side of the paper you want facing out on your candle). Trace the letter with the knife cutting through the craft paper. Punch the letter out and flip the paper over to the side that will be touching the glass. Apply double sided tape to the top, bottom and edge of the paper and roll it around onto the glass. If you use an intricate font, the paper may pop at the letter when it's rolled. If it does this, use small pieces of double sided tape to secure the letter to the glass.
-Drinking glasses (# varies depending on your word or phrase). The glasses should be straight from top to bottom and not tapered.
-Craft Paper (I used a silvery white paper with a sheen to it so it would look as interesting in the day as it does at night). Craft papers come in so may different styles. A foil would be dramatic, a birch or wood grain paper would be more rustic. One tip though, the paper should be opaque so the light shines through the letter cutout and not through the paper as a whole.
-Scissors.
-Exacto knife.
-Double sided tape.
-Printed letters from the computer, enlarged to fit the size of your glass. Choose a font you like but don't get too fancy, chunky fonts are easier to cut out.
Instructions: Cut craft paper to fit around your glass. As shown below, tape printed letter to the craft paper (remember to tape the letter to the side of the paper you want facing out on your candle). Trace the letter with the knife cutting through the craft paper. Punch the letter out and flip the paper over to the side that will be touching the glass. Apply double sided tape to the top, bottom and edge of the paper and roll it around onto the glass. If you use an intricate font, the paper may pop at the letter when it's rolled. If it does this, use small pieces of double sided tape to secure the letter to the glass.
I told you I was excited for Christmas already! I want to hang little wreaths from my dining room chairs this Christmas and I have allot of boxwood in the garden with plenty of branches to spare. I made the wreaths and hung one just to try it out, but I'll put them away until after Thanksgiving..I'm not that bad!
Tiny bundles 0f boxwood branches are wrapped multiple times with wire and then the wire is thread through itself to grab another small bundle and so on. I made these early so I preserved them in silica so they'll last a long time. You can find Silica in bulk at the craft store (it's the small beads inside those tiny packets you find in your new pocket book!). Essentially, it removes the moisture, but doesn't discolor the leaves and make them brittle like air drying does.
Tiny bundles 0f boxwood branches are wrapped multiple times with wire and then the wire is thread through itself to grab another small bundle and so on. I made these early so I preserved them in silica so they'll last a long time. You can find Silica in bulk at the craft store (it's the small beads inside those tiny packets you find in your new pocket book!). Essentially, it removes the moisture, but doesn't discolor the leaves and make them brittle like air drying does.
