Merry Christmas to All, And To All A Good Night

Do you ever have a project you just can’t quite get to?  This is one I had intended to make last year, but I just ran out of hours in the day – and night. 

A few years ago I went to one of my favorite gift stores in Salt Lake the week after Christmas.  All of their Christmas décor was 75% off, and I scored the cutest little Christmas tree.  It has a metal frame and is shaped espalier style – which in a real tree, the branches are trained to grow flat against a wall, supported on a lattice or a framework of stakes.  I enjoyed my little tree the following year, and then an idea began to form in my head – I wanted to make some of these little trees, but what would I use for the frame?  

Unluckily or luckily for us, a Chinese Elm tree had mysteriously started to grow in our back yard.  Chinese Elms are not a desirous tree to have in your yard because they succor and spread everywhere! 

The two positive things about these trees are - they grow fast, and produce very straight limbs.  Perfect for the framework I wanted to use on these miniature trees!  

I used to make corporate gifts for my husband’s work each year, and that is what I chose to do three years ago considering we had a lot of Chinese Elm sticks to use. 

That first year I made 29 trees!  Beware, the lashing is brutal on your hands!  I had intended to make one for each of my two sisters, but I ran out of time and decided to do them the following year, that was last year, 2020.  I normally have my two sisters and their husbands down for a steak and crab leg dinner in December, and I always make a special Christmas decoration for them to take home along with their leftovers.

Because of Covid last year, we were trying to be obedient and not be together in person.  So I went ahead and made the dinner, ordered a darling gathering basket from “Amish Baskets” and doorbell ditched it.  The little espalier Christmas trees once again would have to wait another year.

This year I started working on Christmas in August, and all the gifts I came up with were fun to make, but extremely time consuming.  And once again it didn’t look like the little espalier trees would get finished.  On December 23rd, I was FINALLY finished with the rest of my Christmas projects and my house was cleaned up and decorated as well.  So I went down and brought up all the supplies to finish these trees.  The number over the past year had grown from two trees to three, as a good friend saw them and wanted one as well.  I LOVE to check things off my list, and this project has been an ongoing thing on my list for way too long!  Ron had already cut the branches to the lengths I needed them, and sanded the edges smooth. 

I just needed to lash them together, secure them in the pots I have been tripping over for a year, hot glue the greenery on, add a strand of fairy lights from Amazon, tie their last name initial ornament to the handle on the pot, and place the simple felt star, from “Paper and Felt”, to the top.

I had forgotten how to lash the branches together from last time, and had to look it up again online.  My brain must be tired because I had to watch the video for each of the nine lashings it took to make the frames for the three trees.  I used 3.5mm waxed cotton thread from “Maine Thread Company” to lash them with.  This is also a great product to use for macramé bracelets!  You can order it direct, or on Amazon.

Once I had them lashed, I used wood glue to squeeze in between the lashings to be sure the cross branches didn’t slide down the vertical trunk.

My friend’s tree was in a cute vintage Christmas bucket.  I had ordered some cute checkered metal/enamel buckets from “Mackenzie-Childs” in each of my sister’s favorite home décor colors for these trees, and I didn’t want to ruin them permanently with the “Gap and Crack” spray foam I use to secure to the tree frame into the bucket. 

So I found some inexpensive plastic pots at the nursery that fit perfectly inside the nicer “Mackenzie-Childs” buckets. I centered the tree in the plastic pot and surrounded it with river rocks. 

Then I leaned the tree frame up against a small child’s chair and taped it in place with masking tape so that it stayed exactly in the upright position I needed it to be. 

Then I carefully filled the crevices in the rock base with “Gap and Crack” spray foam from “Lowes”.  Once the crevices were filled, I carefully covered the rest of the rocks.  BEWARE – this stuff grows A LOT, so you want to use a lot less than you really need.  AND it is virtually impossible to get out of your favorite jacket when it spits a big glob out unexpectedly – I sadly learned this the hard way!!!!  So be sure to do this in a well-covered area and don’t wear your favorite jacket. ☹  I don’t know about you, but I am super impatient when I have to wait for something to dry . . . ☺  The can of “Gap and Crack” says it’s set to the touch in 15 minutes, but not totally set for 8 hours. 

I REALLY wanted to start gluing the greenery on, and about 4 hours later I went ahead and started to glue it on my friend’s tree.  I finished hers before I went to bed at 5:30 AM. . . I got up a few hours later and finished the other two trees!    

I used probably five or six different types of evergreen greenery from “Taiwan Imports” in Salt Lake City.  I have a couple of plastic bins of this down my basement left over from other projects, and luckily I had more than enough to complete all three of these final trees. 

I start with one variety, pulling all the sprigs off and begin gluing them on the tips of each branch and the top.  Then I go to the next variety and do the same thing, until the tree in complete. 

I fill in any holes with whatever I have left until it look full, lush, and complete!  

Then I add a strand of battery powered “Fairy Lights” from Amazon.  I LOVE the “HomeStarry” brand of lights.  I buy them in a four pack, and I think the ones I used for this tree are on a 100 light strand.  The tiny LED bulbs are perfectly spaced – I like to use a lot of lights!!!  They have a gold wire which I prefer over a silver wire, they have a timer mode, memory mode, LED bulbs, and a waterproof battery case. 

I put one of these strands of lights on the wreath I made for my grandson’s grave.  It has now been on there four years, and it still works perfectly!  Ron and I take it to his grave the first part of December, and we pick it up just before January.  The lights have turned on every night for the entire month for four years now.  The only thing I have done is put three new AA batteries in each year.  

The battery pack for the trees I made this year, sits behind the tree trunk in the pot or bucket.  Normally I start putting lights on at the top of the tree, but with these, I start at the bottom and work my way to the top.  I have to plan carefully so that I don’t run out of lights before I get to the top!  Once the lights are on, I cover the foam in the top of the pot and battery pack up with “Spanish Moss”.  I get my Spanish Moss from Taiwan Imports, but you can also order it from Amazon.  It’s messy, but easy to clean up, and makes for the perfect finishing touch to many craft projects!

It was Christmas Eve, and starting to get dark by the time I cleaned up my mess and got showered.  Ronnie, being the amazing man he is, offered to drive me to my sister’s homes to drop off their gifts.  Because Ron and I both had surgeries recently, I was not able to do our sister’s dinner before Christmas this year, but plan to do it in the next couple of weeks . . . as soon as I recover from the past five months of Christmas crafting!!! ☺  

I’m so excited to finally be able to check this project off my list, and move on to the many other things I have rolling around in my brain!  But first, I am hoping to take a few days sitting in my comfy chair with my Minky blanket, by the fire and catch up on some Christmas movies!  My Christmas decorations will stay up for a couple weeks after New Years.  Ron and I BOTH enjoy them, and it’s always a sad day when they all come down.  But I feel especially happy and grateful this year for the many blessings in my life, the LIGHT that was shared both to us and by us!  May we look for ways to Be The Light in someone’s life every day, not just in December.  

Love Ya, Les ☺