How-To's Day: Upcycled Holiday Wreath Bases

One of the major staples of Holiday decorating is the WREATH! If you are a big holiday decorator I am sure a new wreath is something you get excited for every year.  Or maybe you know that person who goes koo-koo crazy for decorating and you want to bring them a new wreath for a hostess gift or holiday party. This is a simple and affordable way to create a wreath WITHOUT USING STYROFOAM!!!

While Styrofoam wreaths are the usual bases for crafted wreaths and are a very versatile base to create your own holiday decor, Styrofoam is majorly gnarly on the environment and I try to look for alternatives when personally making my crafts.

I am a huge fan of this method of creating a paper wreath form because it is basically free. Where as a Styrofoam wreath base will run you ~$5.

All you need to make the base is a brown paper shopping bag and a roll of masking tape!!!

After opening the bottom of the grocery bag - scrunch the top of the bag to the bottom, creating a scrunched paper circle. Make sure you take off the handles. The handles can be added to the scrunched shape while taping if there is an uneven surface that needs beefing up.

Using this bag method you will get approximately 11" diameter circle which is a pretty standard small wreath size. To get a larger diameter you can create the circle with paper packaging or tape the grocery bags together.

You can wrap the tape as tight or as loose as you'd like.  Try out a few different tightness-es and see what works for you :)

Normal taping will leave the wreath about 1" thick. If you want a thicker wreath you can add two scrunched shopping bags together, then wrap with tape. This will create a base that is ~ 2" - 2.5" with two and over 3" with three together. If you wrap multiple bases together you should tape everything extra tight and you will have a super strong wreath base sturdy enough for a holiday heirloom for years to come.

The best part of utilizing the paper base is when you want to have a different wreath next year you can recycle this wreath keeping harmful materials like Styrofoam out of our trash!!!

Last year we had a Holiday Making Party where we highlighted sewn fabric bows and we had these wreath forms so people could make their own holiday wreath. Hopefully we can host another party this year and share some ideas so you can host your own with friends too!

Here is a peek at one way to use the base and do a snow theme with old dryer sheets and junk-mail paper snowflakes:

We would love to see your wreaths if you try out this Eco-friendly paper base! Post a comment or leave a picture on Our Facebook to share your holiday decor :)

Happy Making!!! XOXO, KC

How-To's Day: Comic Party Ball Decorations

Kevin here,

The Avengers is out today on Blu Ray and if you are a geek like me, you'll be watching it a lot.  I like to imagine it'll be my revenge for KC's Twilight marathons that can go several days.  So if you are planning on having a marvel marathon viewing party of your own, why not be uber geek and make custom decorations out of comics!

I enlisted KC's help showing me how she made the Party Balls at the last Etsy Night at CAFAM.  These are instructions originally from Mark Montano's demo. I'm going to use old and freeby comic books instead of the Robert Pattinson gossip magazines she uses. These party decorations made from comics are going to make my re-purposed geek party a hit!

Materials

• Paper (30 pages)
• Hot glue gun and sticks
• Scissors
• Pen
• Large throat stapler and staples

Cutting Steps

Step 1
Create a template to trace a 7" diameter circle on your papers.

Step 2
Cut the circle shapes out on 30 pages.

Step 3
Cut 12 little notches proportionally around the circle stack.  Draw lines across your template to line them up first.

Step 4
Group a stack into 15 pages and fold them in half straight through two notches on either side.  Along this crease, staple three times evenly.  Repeat this step, you will have two stacks prepped for gluing.

Gluing Steps

Steps 1-3
Starting between the 1st and 2nd pages of a stack, place glue dots on the first, middle and last notches.

Step 4
Turn the next page down and put glue dots on the two notches not glued on the previous page.

Repeat this process until all the pages are alternately glued together, resulting in a half moon shape.
Do all these steps again for the other stack.  When 2 completed stacks are glued dry, carefully unfold these halves and complete the paper sphere by gluing them (pictured below).

If you have any trouble, Check out more details here too.

I hate to waste good comics, so I used promotional and free stuff.  I plan on creating enough paper decorations with ribbons to disperse around the ceiling of the party room.  Let me know if you guys make some and what kinds of images you use!

-- Kevin Sears

What I Wore: Friday / Instagram Friday! 9/7/12

Hi Guys!

Today I am sporting a denim tube dress and a simple sweater.

Last night I jumped over to CAFAM for their monthly Etsy Craft Night and made some Party Balls.  Mark Montano led the project and I got some good Instagram pictures of the fun.

Here is a break down of the project:

I am always on the hunt for projects to utilize magazines and this project is a mind-blowing way to use them up! I just wish I had tried this project out before making the Etsy party decor. We could have made a ton of these in a jiffy :)


Here is a photo visual breakdown of the steps listed above:
 

Still craving more details you can check out the full project list and steps here.

For more pictures and updates check us out @makeshoplive on Twitter and Instagram. Hope you have a stunning weekend!!!

XOXO, KC

How-To's Day: Paper Decorations for a Craft Party

I love making things out of paper!!! It is one of my absolute favorite materials to work with. One of my favorite materials to have in the studio are maps.  Thomas Guides are especially helpful since there is so many pages of maps inside each one.  The warehouse is so vast down at CRAFTED that basic paper garlands are a must to help add to the decorations.  We recently did a demo using the small tubular ornament template by Martha Stewart Crafts as seen here, and it is the perfect tool to crank out some massive decorations.

For the paper lanterns we are using this time saving tool, but you can also create the same result by folding a 6.5" square into a rectangle, then cutting slits in 1/2" intervals making sure to leave at least a 1/2"  border on the raw edge.

Always an easy favorite when making paper decorations is the classic paper chain.  We have been using the scraps leftover from the lanterns to make paper chains to add to our decorations.

Another awesome paper decoration is these great mini suitcases to reinforce the Wish You Were Here theme as well as decorate their booths. Using a rectangle box and some imagination you can make a super mini suitcase too! Check out this great example from Desiree B-

Off to keep making paper lanterns for our decoration meeting tomorrow ;)

XOXO, KC