Ooh it's THAT time of year again! What's even better than Christmas? The lead-up to Christmas of course! This stems from my Dad who always started the festive prep early because finances tended to be a bit tight. Sometime during late August, a shelf would be cleared in the pantry and over the weeks we'd watch with shining eyes as it filled with all manner of indulgent, glittering comestibles like pickles, crisps, nuts, mince pies, sherry, pop and... wonder of wonders... selection boxes! That excitement and anticipation has never left me and in adult life has transformed itself into a more creative outlet, I just LOVE LOVE LOVE doing Christmas craft. This activity is always better and more satisfying if you can use recycled materials and you'll never believe what you can transform with a little imagination. All this brings back memories of coming home from school clutching a festive candle made from a toilet roll, cotton wool and a bit of glitter - anyone else remember those?
This year I have three lovely ideas to inspire you but instead of one great long rambling post, I'm going to spread them over three perfectly formed little posts, and the first of these is...
Miniature festive paper bunting!
I've never made these before but wished I had as they turned out wonderful! Just take a look...
This particular semi-circle design was very easy and actually, you could just cut out foil [or colored paper] circles, glue them up and fold them over a length of string or ribbon. However, because there'd be no weight in the circles, they'd probably curl up wouldn't hang as well as these. The only thing I did differently was to cut out semi-circles of card and slot them in before closing and sticking the paper down.
In the images above you can see how I used an old jar lid to template a circle, then halved the shape to create semi-circles of slightly heavier card for a bit of weight. You can see here that I also used pretty red and white festive twine but plain jute string and ribbon works just as well.
Please note that the reason I call these buntings "miniature" is because they're not very long, the length is only around 4ft which is perfect for over a fire-place or door.
Also, how lovely is the gold and silver paper? Any ideas where this came from? Well, the gold paper previously covered a large bar of chocolate and the silver? You'll never guess!
STOCK CUBE PAPERS!
I'm such a magpie when it comes to collecting papers, chocolate and sweet wrappers, bits of foil, ribbon and string. They don't take up much space and make great craft materials!
My next bunting is with the more traditional triangular shaped flags and the method is only slightly different. Here you draw out your basic flag template and then add a little section on the top to fold over the string.
A little tip here, these photos show the thicker card as being cut exactly the same flag shape as the silver paper. However, if you do this, when you fold the extra section over the string and stick it down, the thicker card takes quite some pressing down before it stops popping up. So, when you cut the card out, I suggest you don't add the extra section at the top, then you'll only be folding and sticking down the thinner silver paper.
After making the gold and silver flag bunting, I found I had a lot of triangular off-cuts and not liking to waste anything, I decided to use them in this festive icicle design...
Of course, you can use any design to make pretty bunting and being a crafter, I always have scraps of images from previous projects. For these next few strings I used an image of an old and beloved cat [his name was Marlon Savage]. Years ago, I used his portrait, adding flowers to make him look coquettish, on the prettiest little oval brooches and I had a number of the images left...
Here's a smaller, more delicate string ...
So there you go, my first festive "Let's make..." post, I do hope you enjoyed it. In these challenging COVID times, we're all feeling anxious and nervy, and for me, concentrating on these crafts calms my mind and my heart AND as I'll be giving these away as Christmas gifts, I'm already making headway on my festive to-do list so it's a win win :)
This particular craft is great for children and, instead of the extra fuss of putting in thicker card, children can use much smaller shapes and put them on longer strings to decorate a Christmas tree!
HAPPY CRAFTING!
Epilogue:
A few years ago, I published two posts on creating Christmas tree decorations from everyday household items and you can read them here:
Let's make... Christmas tree decorations [part1] 2016
Let's make... Christmas tree decorations [part2] 2016
Some of my childhood Christmas memories <3
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