heart ties and baubles

I have a couple of heart ice cube trays I picked up at the dollar store years ago.  I finally found a different purpose for one of the trays other than, well, ice cubes or molded chocolate.  I decided to make these heart ties and baubles by molding some plaster and doodling away.

If you have a little girl, they’re going to love designing their own hair ties and baubles.  There is a more durable variety of plaster you can use for this purpose.  As for me, I think I’m going to use these to accent some small boxes for my Valentine.

You will need a heart ice cube tray, unused hair ties, plaster, disposable bowl, disposable spoon, and permanent markers.

1.  For baubles, you will need to cut open two hair ties.

2. Mix plaster as directed on the package.  Carefully spoon into mold.  While plaster is still wet, place the hair ties in the mold.  For baubles, you will need to place two cut hair ties.   Make sure the hair ties are upright.

3. Doodle your desired pattern using permanent markers.

You can really personalize these by writing names and initials.

I can even see the baubles being used as napkin rings for a Valentine wedding – one heart having the initial of the bride and the other, the groom.  Or they can be used as favor tags for a small box of truffles.

foil pie pan rose topiary

If you’re still considering what to use as a centerpiece this holiday, here’s a very stunning project you can easily do: make silver rosettes out of the edges of foil pie pans and glue them together into one very marvelous and modern topiary.

This is one of those ideas I wish I had conceived earlier in the season.  The belated idea only dawned on me last weekend as I was making my floral stamped clay bangles, which I baked on a couple of foil pie pans.  I’ve been saving them for purposes like that and this.  I always knew my small collection of foil pie pans could be used for something really wonderful.  However, I was kidding myself — I could barely make a topiary out of the handful stored in my cupboard.  This project requires a good bundle of them — eighty in total.  I bought much, much more from the dollar store and managed to pull off this décor masterpiece for less than $15 (and that includes a whole pack of glue sticks, also from the dollar store). 

You will need:

a. 30 of 9″ pie pans and 50 of 4″ pie pans.

b. Hot glue gun and glue sticks (I used up a pack of 16 glue sticks).

c. Balloon, strips of newspaper, and some white glue or papier maché paste.

d. Paint and paint brush.

1. Papier maché your balloon.  I use a simple 1:1 ratio of white glue and water.  Let dry and release the balloon.

2. Paint the papier maché ball.  I chose an apple green color that I imagined would give a funky dimension to the topiary, however, in hindsight, I wish I had chosen black.

3. Cut away the flat bottom of your foil pie pan.

4. Roll into a rose. Please BE CAREFUL as the edges are sharp.  Only touch the uncut edges.

5. Continue steps 3 and 4 for all 80 pans.

6. Using a hot glue gun, randomly glue the roses on the papier maché ball.

The result of this project turned out so much better than I had conceived in my mind.  I had the fear that it would look cheap, but it’s in fact no easy guess that this topiary is made from foil pie pans!  I intend on using this topiary for several holiday seasons.  What’s best is that once I’m done with it years from now, it will go straight into recycling.  The foil pie pans are 100% recyclable, so is the papier maché ball I used as a base.

 P.S. If you’re having a modern winter wedding, I think this might be the diva-on-a-dime décor item for you.

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a new life for old plastic snowflakes

Chances are, you’ve started digging through your attic, basement, or garage for boxes of holiday paraphernalia.  Before you close the box on those dusted decades old plastic snowflake ornaments, it’s time to reconsider getting them out of retirement and giving them a new lease on life.

They make for stunning shimmering dual-purposed-napkin rings -slash-place-cards.  And they are guaranteed to get anyone in a festive mood when tied to a beautiful ribbon around a good bottle of wine (well, we know wine gets anyone in a festive mood any time of year, but this way sure fills it up with cheer).  And they make for a gorgeous tag to flatter a gorgeously wrapped present.

To make the place card napkin rings, I glued new hair elastics (I picked up a bundle of 100 in a variety of exciting colors from the dollar store which I will use up on future projects).  I am not a fan of hot glue, especially on plastic, and only use it for a handful of projects when absolutely needed.  What I am, though, is a Weldbond girl.  I Weldbond almost everything and it’s never let me down.  Simply apply a generous dot of the white stuff on the back of the snowflake and press the elastic into it until it’s mostly covered with glue and wait patiently until it dries clear.

I also think these snowflake place card napkin rings would make wonderful decorative touches for a white winter wedding, wouldn’t you agree?

fairytale wedding invitations

It was a busy and memorable Canadian Thanksgiving weekend.  My good friends were wed at the historical Casa Loma in Toronto.  Not only was I honored to stand in at their wedding as part of their bridal party, I was also granted the delightful task of designing and producing all of their wedding stationery.

It was a welcome experience.  From the start, my friends were certain the castle would be the focus of their wedding invitation.  They, a winsome pair, were positively set on a charming and cheeky design and I was put to the test.  What resulted were the following: a battlement containing all invitation inserts, a door concealing the bride and groom, and three inserts in three gradations of blue, which when put together display the entire height of the castle’s tower.  This invitation set is one of my most cherished works in my five years of stationery design, and for good reason — they are for cherished friends.

‘print-while-you-party’ photo cards

Two weeks ago,  I assisted in hosting a surprise bridal brunch for a friend.  We wanted to thank the guests with a memorable favor.  It became unanimous that we would take a group photo right after the surprise, run the camera to the drug store (conveniently across the restaurant) for 1-hour photo finishing, and have the photos given to the guests before parting.  We wanted the photos inserted into something more personal than store-bought picture frames.  So I proposed to make thank you card frames instead.  They were uncomplicated, practical, and definitely surprised the guests and bride-to-be.