Christmas Tree Swirl

 A couple of weeks ago, various relatives and I attended Witches Night Out at Gardner Village. While there I walked through the Celebrations store. 

The first thing to catch my eye were large, glittery, swirls poking out of a Christmas tree. (of course, no photo) I loved them. The rest of my walk through the store I was thinking about how I could copy them. Even when my witches hat nearly became tangled in all the low hanging decor. 

Witch (ha) a random, non employee, lady got all in my face about.  

also, 

I'm not the only pointy witch hat wearing shopper on Witches night. 

So I would call that an oversight on the store. 

ok seriously, heres how I made swirls.  

In "the Hebes" I lived by a pharmacist. He heard me say the word "Chipboard" once. The pharmacy delivery boxes all come with 2 pieces of chipboard on top and bottom that generally gets thrown out with the cardboard. He brought me all of the chipboard from about 6 months by the look of my stash. I figured it would be a perfect way to make these. I penciled in the basic shape I wanted and while I was drawing it I realized I could get a smaller one in there as well. Using an x-acto knife, I cut them out. By about the last few, I wondered if a scroll saw would work and was wishing I had one. 

I painted a base coat but decided it was too light

So I added a deeper color stippling for texture. 

Then I found glitter spray. 

My design consultant on this project was my 12 year old son. We wanted a wintery finish on the edges, so I mixed a little bit of white embossing powder mixed with Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel. I "inked" the swirl edges with a Versamark pad to hold the powder and heat set. 

This gave it a sort of glossy, icy look. I'm not entirely sure it was worth the effort. 

Of course now that this is all done, I found the perfect thing that would have made this faster and easier. 

Oh Martha, I have avoided you for so long. I didn't even notice you sitting there on the Home Depot shelf, whispering "Hey there weird, red head that likes to make projects harder. I'm right here"  

There are some great colors. I'm trying to find a project to use the awesome Green and the Red. They totally match my Christmas decorations.

But it's all good. I pulled out my tree Just so I could get a beauty shot. 

My co designer said he liked the swirls but the tree just didn't look right.  

Silly boy,  I only "decorated"the top third of the tree, used 16 little "pick" decorations, and it's in the wrong room. 

I'll take more photos when we actually decorate. 

Halloween side note:

Since moving, I have gone from 10-12 bags of candy to 2 and they are done by about 7:30. I kind-a like it. I Hope your Halloween is fun and that the little spooks are nice. 

Christmas Starburst Continued

A couple of weeks ago I did a small post about the Starburst I wanted to make. I thought it went up. but this week I realized it probably hadn't.  

So Here is the missing post.  

I had already started my starburst and had pieces glued in before I even considered putting it on a blog. So there is a pretty important photo missing. I was in Michael's and found a round wood "block". They had one that was  5" diameter, 1" thick for $.99. I brought it home and set it on my Quilting Mat marking the vertical, horizontal and cross lines

                                                                  Badly improvised shot 

I drilled a hole at each of those marks then added 2 in between. Giving a total of 24. I then carried it to the store with me to find dowels that fit. You could buy a package of precut dowels but I wanted mine longer.  I bought 12 dowels, making sure to watch for straight ones, then with Painters tape, I taped them together and cut them a bit off center so every other one was longer.  

One tip is to lay all the dowels parallel to spray paint. I had already glued mine in. It took 2 cans to cover each individually. Spraying them together will save you paint.  

Next up are the mirrors. I wanted different sizes. JoAnn's had the best price. I was able to get a package of 4-2" mirrors for $.99. Everywhere else was about double that. The price for 24-1", was about the same everywhere, usually just over $2.00.

5" flat mirrors are available at any of the stores. But I took the advice of the wonderful Epbot.com and bought a 5" blind spot mirror from O'rileys for $8.00. I considered driving around to find a better price, then decided I would waste as much in gas as I might save. It came on a plastic base with a large mounting bracket on the back so out comes the Dremel tool. (and a smile on my face)

It is slightly rounded giving a little extra dimension to the starburst. 

Now here is where the "Mel" brain kicks in. I wanted to make sure I had a secure mount on the mirrors,  and sitting them on top of a rounded dowel hoping the glue would hold wasn't working in my mind. I grabbed some fabric from the stash. I did the blue to see it better but I actually used muslin which was cut much more flat and a little wider than the mirror. 

Pinching it together, I added hot glue at the ends.

Making a nifty little sleeve that wraps around the dowel. 

I then slide them on figuring out how I wanted mine to look. Once each mirror was placed I went back and glued them down. 

The last step is setting the rounded mirror. I used E6000 Glue. 

 I placed a soft cloth on top of the mirror and set a book over that till it set. Then clean off the mirrors and try to stay away from a teen age, blond daughter just itching to touch each one as you cleaned it. 

And that's it.  

Pretty Huh?  

I did add some wood rounds that will hopefully tie it into my new accent I'm making for the Christmas tree. (Christmas Swirl post) They are neutral enough that I think this sun burst will be staying put for a while.  

See you next week.

Christmas Starburst

I have a really ugly 70's fireplace in my front room.  Can you picture it already just from that description? It is dark stone that climbs up the wall and dominates my badly furnished room.  It usually just sits there and is what it is supposed to be, most of the year. But at Christmas time it is a large dark eyesore. It doesn't even have a mantle, so no redeeming quality there.

                                       Also, there is no light in this room so any photo I take will be bad. 

Last year as I brought out my bright, happy, Christmas decor, that fireplace just sat there, darkening the room.  I tried to think of a way to brighten it. I hung chicken wire in a conical shape over all that stone ending about where a Mantle would. I wired a couple of gold painted branches to it, then filled it with snow flake decorations and sparkling picks. I was happy with it. Happy enough. But I can't really picture myself going to all the trouble again. 

Then I saw it. The perfect idea. In a post on one of my most favorite blogs Epbot.com http://www.epbot.com/2013/10/my-bedroom-redo-reveal.html  Seriously, Prepare yourselves for this awesome room.  (And this great blog that I will refer to often.)  

In the middle of this post there is this very cool starburst.

  Totally love this. They even include a how-to.

I was told to not make posts too long so tomorrow I will post my own steps, tricks and results. It's long. 

Starting a blog.

A friend of mine suggested a blog for my various projects. Just as somewhere to post more than the Facebook basics. I have about 5 in mind right now and maybe a couple of old ones just because.

I have a strange brain and a strange method. I have basic home ec. sewing skills and what ever wood working skills will hold the piece together. I know there are far more talented and creative people with much more artistic imagination. I just like to stay busy and make things work, so this will just be a spot to share the progress and the outcome.

I can already see myself finding things at yard sales just to post the result thus causing me to spend money where I shouldn't have. So I am telling myself now -this is not a spot to make things just to make them. There will be a purpose.

I am not sure how often I will post.  This is a whole new thing for me. We will just see where it takes us.