DIY GOLDEN CHRISTMAS TREE CENTERPIECES – A TUTORIAL
DIY GOLDEN CHRISTMAS TREE CENTERPIECES – A TUTORIAL
I’m feeling a little nostalgic today. I’ll try not to get too gushy though. It’s just that it seems like yesterday when my son Taylor was a senior at Rim of the World High School.
Now he’s a senior at Duke University and he lives in that beautiful, Hogwarts-Style dormitory you see there. The thing is, it costs a whole lotta pretty pennies to go to school at Duke University.
So, I was mighty happy when Taylor won himself a scholarship to help pay for that beautiful Hogwarts-Style Dormitory. In fact, Taylor and his fellow scholarship recipients were mighty happy too!
One of the really great things about living in Lake Arrowhead is the real sense of community we enjoy here. There are numerous organizations on this mountain that support our kids with very generous scholarships. One of these really great organizations is a women’s group called LACRWF that holds a fundraiser at Christmas. They raffle off small, decorated Christmas trees donated by local businesses, organizations and individuals.
Four years ago they awarded their annual scholarship to Taylor. Ever since, in an effort to give back, I have helped with this fundraiser by making the centerpieces for the tables. This year the theme was “O Christmas Tree” so, in keeping with the theme, I made these Golden Christmas Trees. In fact, I made fifteen of these Golden Christmas Trees.
I was hoping you might like them, so I thought I’d show you how I made them. That way, you can have your very own Golden Christmas Tree.
The first thing I recommend doing is getting one of your best buddies to help you out. In my case, I called on my homie, Cindy, to help me out. It’s so much more fun with a friend……
……and it’s especially fun with friends that bring champagne! I recommend that they do that too:)
It is also especially good if your friend has a husband who is an engineer and can figure out how to make a stick stand up in a box. Cindy’s got one of those husbands and he figured out how to spray insulation foam in the box, stick a gold painted dowel down the middle of it, and wa-la! You’ve got a garage full of boxes with sticks in them. It’s also handy to know your local Post Mistress who generously donated the Priority Mail boxes we used.
The next thing you do is take your helper buddie on a field trip for supplies. In our case, we took a field trip to my old stompin’ grounds, Orange County! They have a super-dooper floral supply company called “Shinoda Design Center.” It is a virtual Disneyland for interior designers, crafters and floral enthusiasts. You need to have a resale permit to shop at Shinoda’s, as it is only open to “The Trade.” You can find more information about Shinoda here. On our shopping expedition we purchased:
- Sparkly golden cones to use as our Christmas trees
- Wired glittery stars
- Wired gold ribbon
- Rolls of sequined golden tape
- Oasis floral bricks
- Packages of silky fabric table runners
- Sparkly gold wrapping paper
The first thing we did was to insert the stars on the top of the cones.
Next, we cut the oasis bricks into circles that would fit inside the bottom of the cones.
Using hot glue, we glued the oasis to the cone.
Next, I made a template in order to find the center of each cone. I made an indentation in the oasis as a marker.
Then, I hot-glued a round, metal washer onto the oasis, encircling the center point.
Before long, I had done this to all 15 cones. The next thing we did was to gift-wrap our Priority Mail boxes. It was a little tricky because of the gold painted dowels that were sticking out of them. We used double-stick tape to neatly attach the paper to the boxes.
And this was the end result.
I love double-stick tape!
Meanwhile, Cindy carefully cut 30 strips of our sparkly, sequined tape, 2 strips per box. She measured carefully to achieve a precise fit around the boxes.
Using a hot glue gun and wearing gloves, we carefully glued the tape around the 4 sides of the boxes.
This was the result.
Next, we determined that we’d like the cone to rest at the 7 inch mark on the golden dowel.
We then tapped a thin nail through the dowel. The cone would eventually rest on this nail, but that step comes later.
In the meantime, we made 15 bows out of our golden, wired ribbon. There is an art to making bows. Stay tuned and one of these days, very soon, I will teach you how to make them.
In order to have a beautiful, full bow, you need to open them from the inside out, alternating left, right, left. Then, tie the bow onto the bottom of each dowel.
Finally, we inserted the dowel through the washer and oasis, letting the washer come to rest on the nail.
We then added a touch of hot glue to secure the washer to the nail.
And, after about two long days of effort, we were ready to rock & roll……
……right on over to the beautiful Lake Arrowhead Country Club where our golden centerpieces would adorn the tables.
And money could be made to support more scholarships for lucky young people that will go off and live in college dormitories far, far, away.
So there you have it: DIY GOLDEN CHRISTMAS TREE CENTERPIECES – A TUTORIAL
I hope you liked my Golden Christmas Trees. Do you have a DIY Christmas craft you make this time of year?
PS – The people from Shinoda Design Center haven’t got a clue who I am. I just like their store and enjoy telling you where you can make great finds.
All opinions expressed in this post are my own. All photos are the original property of Celia Becker @ www.AfterOrangeCounty.com and may not be reproduced without specific permission.
