Santa's Cookie Tray

Santa Cookie Tray

The other day I found an old frame I had purchased at a thrift store with the intention of making it into some sort of serving tray. With Christmas fast approaching, I thought the perfect idea would be a fun tray to leave Santa's cookies and milk on. (I apologize for the glare on some of these. Rotten time of day to get a good picture.) Supplies needed: 1 thrifted frame (with the glass still in) big enough to hold a small plate of cookies and glass of milk Paint-acrylic or spray Scrap paper in Christmas colors/themes Letter stickers, die cuts, or computer to make title Adhesive Trim, stamps, embellishments as desired First rough up your frame for easier painting. I lucked out that the gold trim on this one was just painted gold. :) Next paint your desired color. I used Ebony from Americana paints (which you can find at Hobby Lobby, Roberts Arts and Crafts, etc.) While that's drying, take the cardboard backing and start piecing together your paper. It was easier for me to think of this part as making one giant Christmas card. When you're doing this, remember to leave yourself a slight margin all the way around to prevent your work from being covered up by the frame. I used only supplies I had on hand and got to revisit a favorite technique-embossing. I didn't have any sparkly ribbon so I found a snowflake stamp in my collection. First stamp the image with Versa Mark ink (a clear pigment ink) then sprinkle with silver embossing powder. Gently tap the board over a scrap paper to remove excess powder and melt the powder with a heat gun. Repeat the process for the stars on top of the Christmas trees. When you're satisfied with the way it looks, pop it into your dried frame. When I was finished, I discovered a pleasant surprise. Not only will this make a darling tray to hold Santa's goodies, but will be a fun decoration to use the other 24 days of December! (I bet you could come up with something fun for a cute Thanksgiving tray, too!)

Family Tree

During this time of year our hearts turn to our families and when I saw these simple, excellent trees (just $5!) at IKEA, I instantly knew what I wanted to do with them!

I started out by making a family tree for myself, but then I realized that my mother-in-law would absolutely love this and I set out to make one for her first.

I began by drawing the leaves on regular white card stock in waterproof ink. Since I did it free hand, I had to re-do a lot, but for just 18 leaves it wasn't a big deal. Then I wrote the name and birth year of each person on the family tree (using the waterproof pen).

I also made a plaque with my husband and his siblings for the trunk.

Next I used water colored pencils (3 of them) to color in the shading on leaves. Watercolor pencil marks can be washed over with water on a brush to blend the colors and I used this technique. After the leaves were dry, I pressed them into a clear embossing pad and used Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel (UTEE) and a heat gun to give the leaves a gorgeous shine as well as make them stronger.

To hang them on the tree, I used a box cutter to cut small grooves into the plastic coating on the tree. I looped wire through a small hole on the leaf stem, added some beads and tied a simple square knot at the back. I set the wire loops into the grooves and added some super hold glue with a really fine tipped tube. Voila! A family tree! (now, how am I going to wrap this thing?)

--C