Tag: evergreen

Christmas, Craft Projects, DIY GIFT GUIDE, Holiday, Quick and Easy Crafts

DIY GIFT GUIDE: Spool Ornament

Jessica Smith

Spool Ornament Cover

Today’s DIY GIFT GUIDE post is even easier than yesterday’sĀ and would look super cute on your Christmas tree!

Know someone who sews? Then this would be the perfect gift for them! Turn an old wooden spool into a Christmas ornament in just a few steps.

Supplies:

  • Wooden spool
  • Wire
  • Ribbon
  • Beads
  • Wire Cutter
  • Scissors

Steps:

  • The worst part of this project is the first part. Remove any old thread from your spools so they are completely bare. I did the by unraveling each spool, but if you don’t have the patience (not sure how I did) you could score yours off with an exacto knife.

Spools

  • Once your spools are naked (hehe), cut a long pice of wire and fold it in half. Thread a seed bead onto the end and let it rest in the bend of the wire. This will stop your larger beads and spool from falling off of the wire.
  • Thread your beads onto the wire — thread through both ends of the wire.
  • Thread your wire through the spool, then add beads on top. I liked my ornament simple and just added one bright red bead below and above my spool. You can add as many as you’d like.
  • Create a loop in the wire after you add your last bead, then secure the wire by wrapping the long ends around the base of the loop until your wire runs out.
  • Tie a piece of ribbon through the loop to make a hook for the tree.
  • Embellish your spool with a large ribbon.
  • Ta da! Hang on your tree!

spool

If you want to get fancy, seal the ends of your ribbon with a no-fray fabric treatment. I haven’t done that to mine, but I probably will before I gift them.

spool ornamentCheck back tomorrow for another gift idea!

 

 

Christmas, Craft Projects, Holiday, Wreath

Christmas Centerpiece

Jessica Smith

How many times can I say I have awesome neighbors?

Well, it’s just true and I’m gonna keep shouting that I love them. Because they rock.

Sunday, our neighbor came over to watch football with Brian, so the wives got together and hung out too! But get this, we cleaned! Ye, that is a good friend. Allie and I cleaned the hell out of my craft room, which so desperately
 needed it. I threw away a ton of stuff that I wasn’t going to use. I have a pile of crafts to gift this Christmas. And I have a bunch of stuff to donate.

While cleaning, we also found/rediscovered some materials I had bought in the past two years and just never got around to using. For example, a floral ring. Turns out, I had a perfect glass dish (it holds the dip in our now-deceased chip and dip set… thanks, Brian haha) to fit in the center.

So after we cleaned, we headed to Michaels and bought some fake winter foliage to make a Christmas centerpiece.

This project was so easy and would make a great gift. And if you get to Michaels when they are having a sale (50% off of all holiday flowers and an extra 25% off!), it’s not terribly expensive.

I started with the floral ring, and I bought the flowers and the silver charger ($2) at the craft store.

I started by tearing up the floral pieces that I got so each branch, pearl, stem, etc. was separate. Then, I glued the floral ring to the center of the charger.

Starting at the bottom, I started to place large piece of evergreen around the base.

Christmas Centerpiece beginning

And basically, that’s it. No more gluing — just sticking! I worked my way around and around and around. And when I thought I might be done, I wasn’t. So I added more. Once the greenery had good coverage, I added white and silver pearls. These are also available in the floral section and come on wire. So again, just stick ’em where you want ’em.

An important thing to note — I left the center untouched so my dish would still fit in the center. I did place evergreen along the top edge of the center, but nothing in the actual hole in the center. I will be using a fake candle, so I wasn’t too worried about things catching fire.

Christmas Centerpiece

So what do you think!? Isn’t it purdy? I don’t think I would have ever thought to do this if it weren’t for Allie. She was going to make it for me, but she was going to use real plants and that would have kicked it after a season so I opted for fake.

Christmas Centerpiece lit up

She did do another project for my house while I made this centerpiece and hers is even more beautiful.

Centerpiece

I ā¤ neighbor craft nights!

What Christmas crafts have you all been up to? I have a lot more things I want to make this year. Here’s hoping I have time!

Christmas, Craft Projects, Holiday, Quick and Easy Crafts, Wine Crafts

Wine cork grape ornaments

Jessica Smith

I think this craft is one of my all-time favorites. My neighbor and I did a craft night before my Trash to treasure fair and we made so many cool things out of corks!

Unfortunately, I only have photos of the finished project. It’s hard to remember to take photos when you are crafting with one of your best friends. It’s basically non-stop talking mixed with singing along to Christmas music.

Anyway, check these out!IMG_0020

To make a wine cork grape ornament, you will need 8 wine-stained corks, a thin piece of cork, wire, hot glue, ribbon and a leaf!

First, you will need to cut the tops of your corks off. We used sharp knives from my kitchen to cut through the cork. Err, correction, Allie used the sharp knives… I couldn’t stand the noise it made. Either way, cut about half an inch from the wine stained end. We didn’t care if ours we all the same length because the different sizes gave the ornament a nice depth to it. (Can an ornament have depth?)

IMG_0021

Once the cork tops were sliced off, I arranged them on a flat piece of cork that Allie got from TJ Maxx. It’s super thin and was meant to be a placemat. It worked great for this project, but you could use really anything to glue the corks onto. Cardboard, maybe.

Once the corks were arranged in a grape shape, we traced around them and cut out the cork. Then, we glued the leaf at the top (from a fake flower) and proceeded to glue each grape onto the cork.

IMG_0022

When the glue dried, I poked wire through the cork and made a hidden loop behind the leaf. Then I strung my ribbon through the top and hung it on our holiday garland!

I absolutely love these ornaments and will definitely be gifting a few this holiday season.