Hello blog friends!
We had a great time being the on-site store at the Encore Dance Studio crop last Saturday! It was super thrilling for me to hear how many of those ladies popped by this blog to see what we are creating! Thank you for that, it means the world to me!
While at the crop we even had time to make a few creations of our own! Thanks to Ann and Christa for having us!
For today's tutorial, I am going to start a series of how-to's about make small gift items that would be perfect for hostess gifts or teachers gits, etc. since we are approaching Thanksgiving and other big entertaining holidays.
Today I will show you an embellished candle that I created, along with a coordinating gift card.
First off, choose the product you would like to work with. I have a selection of papers from MME's 'Mischievous" line and some American Crafts embellishments from the 'Night Fall' line. Both of these collections are currently available in our store.
Then I choose a punch and a leaf die to use, this is one of my favourite punches and I knew I wanted to add leaves to go with my fall theme. You can cut leaves with punches, a die cutting machine like the Cricut or by hand, as well.
And here is a look at the main pieces for my embellished candle.
Next, I ran the leaves through my sewing machine to add some texture and mock veining right down the centre. I snipped off the extra thread, but I did leave some short tails as I liked the distressed, not quite perfect look it gave as well as a bit of texture.
And then I inked all of the piece with a Tim Holtz's Distress Ink, I also added a bit of charcoal chalk ink along the very edges of my pieces to give them a little more definition. This is a good tip, if you are using papers together that do not have a lot of contrast to each other.
Now when I attached the collar to the candle I knew I wanted it to be really secure to last throughout the holiday season, so I chose to adhere the papers together with Glassy Accents.
Then I used Terrifically Tacky Tape to adhere one end of the collar to the other end (you could also use Score Tape of any other really strong adhesive).
Do not adhere anything directly to the candle if you or your recipient plan to use the candle at any time. You want to be able to slide the collar off for safety purposes, before lighting the candle.
Next, I layered the leaves in a pleasing manner and stapled them together. This is a quick way to make sure your layers stay how you intended, don't worry we will hide the staple! Some strategic bending and crumpling of the leaves, gives them some texture. Adhere these to your collar with Glossy Accents.
A little piece of twill, stapled to keep it folded and glued on top of the leaves.
Next I added one of the little fan-fold flowers. And even though these have a pop dot already on the back of them I always add a little Glossy Accents to them if I am creating something for display purposes that could get handled. We want our beautiful creations to last, right?
Here is a look at my completed embellished candle. Perfect as is for a Halloween or fall decor element or gift.
However, I decided mine would more likely be a Thanksgiving decor element, so I covered up the little 'Halloween" sentiment wit a button.
A couple of close - ups for you.
And now on to the little gift card, I used all of the same basic elements to create this little 3"x3" card.
Thank you for stopping by today to see what we are up to!
Laura
xoxo
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