Wednesday 17 December 2014

DIY Christmas Decorations Pt. 1

So this is just going to be a short one, Christmas is nearly here and I wanted to give my friends a homemade present they would appreciate. Being that they are all in fairly new apartments (we are all expats in Paris) and that I have very limited finances, I was a bit stuck. And there is the perpetual problem of just because I like it does not mean THEY will... So after much brain wracking and making several things including these tea light holder (below), I settled on tree decorations.


As you can see the one on the left is much more Christmassy than the other, I was toying with ideas... I will do a tutorial of the tea light jars on the weekend as I have a lot of ideas for these (and I have been saving a lot of jars).

Who knows, maybe they would have preferred up-cycled jam jars now candle holders, but these are new friends and maybe I shouldn't experiment TOO much.

So instead I made TONS of these...

Really simple, I bought air dry clay and cut the shapes out using a glass (I am currently sans cookie cutters- this would have opened a whole host of options I simply did not have this time). Once I had the shape I ran my finger around the edges so soften them then got creative. I searched the cupboards for ANYTHING I could use to make imprints on them. I am lucky in that I live with an eccentric French lady who happened to be out at the time.... 

I mostly used the bottoms of crystal dishes and glasses (yes I know what you are thinking...) and the edges of her silverware. The crimpled edges that you can see clearly on the top two in the right picture were as a result of the bottom of a dish, the more ornate patterns were the same section of silverware I simply pressed my decoration into several times (they looked cute on a few blank ones around the edges).

I then made holes with a nail and stamped in the words. As you can see "Christmas" was too long, so I switched to French...! I tried coloured acid free distress inks on my letters, when they dried the colour was gone. My cheap black was deff best.

I did not even paint them! White and black is classic. I waited for them to dry for 24hours, then flipped them.


Once they were dry I added string. Just rustic ordinary string I had, which I love. This is the only one that remains now that I haven't given away for me to show you... Partly because it was a bad one haha.

After I split them up int sets of six or so. However I then saw my roommates tree and saw how glittery it was, so to make hers extra special, I attacked them with glitter:


The Paris ones did not really work, but I thought its squiffiness would make her laugh. In order for the glitter to stay I coated them PVA first, then glittered, then once dry I coated again in glue (this is all before adding the string).


Et voila! I made tags from recycled xmas paper from last year and some festive paper bags I found in a local craft store. I have already given out two packets and they were well received. I was pleased with the results...

Jam jar candle holders next up I think!



No comments:

Post a Comment