Christmas Crafting – My Favorite Time Of Year!
/I’ve been working on a lot of Christmas projects over the past couple months. I will be posting more of them in the coming weeks, but for today, I want to post one that I’ve been gathering things over the past three years for this project! I have selective patience. In life I prefer things to happen “soon”! If you’ve watched “The Chosen” movies about the Savior, His definition of “soon” and mine are not the same. 😊 However, when I have a project in my mind, I can be as patient as necessary to search and find all the necessary items needed to complete it.
I rarely pay full price for projects like this. I picked the wreath up a couple years ago after Christmas for a fraction of the regular price in the clearance section at “J & J Nursery” in Layton, Utah. If you haven’t been to J & J, you should go! They have the most magical gift shop, especially at Christmas time! Their Christmas open house is this Friday, November 14th.
This wreath could actually use a few more bottle brush trees, but for now, 50 will have to be enough. Maybe I’ll find a few more after Christmas to add to it. Prior to Christmas these can range anywhere from $25 each down to $7. I got most of these for $1 to $5 each, and I love them! As you can see there are many shades of green, in all shapes and sizes. I wanted it to look like a forest of bottle brush trees. The plan was to use a faux evergreen wreath and not have much of it show. When I set the trees on it this year to see if I had enough to complete the project, I decided to go for it. You can still see some of the evergreen wreath in places, but a few more trees will fix that.
At first I didn’t plan to add a house in with it, but when I saw this one recently at World Market, I used my $5 coupon to get it for $9 instead of $14. When I just looked this up online, it has them listed for $19.99. I looked at the price tag on mine, and it was only $14. So evidently, they have either gone up in price over the past week, or they are less money in store. I picked mine up at Farmington Station here in Utah. They come in the luscious green one I got, a pretty pink, and a lovely periwinkle blue. It would be fun to do a wreath with all pink trees or all blue trees to match these little houses. I won’t be doing that, but the thought did cross my mind. I’m not spending another three years collecting more bottle brush trees. 😊 These little houses or stores are made of laser cut wood instead of the customary heavy chipboard. Normally I prefer the chipboard, but these are super cute!
My cute friend Jackie James, from “Bespoke Flowers” in Chicago, sent me the link for these fantastic lights on Amazon. Jackie’s work is incredible! If you’re in the Chicago area, be sure to look her up. I’m posting the link for the lights here for you.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CN2VP428?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title&th=1
I used two strands on this wreath. They have 200 lights per strand and are 20 feet long. As you may know, I am addicted to LIGHT and these firecracker fairy lights do not disappoint! They are battery operated, can be used indoors or out, be set on a timer, or also turned on with a remote that comes with each strand of 200 lights. My favorite fairy lights have gold wires. These are more of a copper color, but I love them just as much. I’m not as big a fan of the silver wire fairy lights.
You may be wondering what a firecracker light is? These came out a few years ago, but this is the first time I’ve seen them using the tiny fairy light LED bulbs. Firecracker decorative light strands are where there are clusters of lights along the entire length of the light strand. I prefer the warm white color because of its softness and warmth. With them being LED, the batteries last almost the entire holiday season, and they don’t get hot. Firecracker lights give off much more light because there are a lot more bulbs on each strand.
These lights have 8 different modes but flashing lights give me a headache, so I prefer them to be on all the time. You can also adjust the brightness using the remote control. I turn the brightness up all the way on mine.
Ron is a kind and patient man with my many projects. At the moment it looks like Christmas has exploded in our home, and not in a good way. There are projects all over the house. Some are for clients that are ready to be picked up, others are mine. This wreath has been sitting on the floor next to our dining room table for a week now as I have been playing with the placement of the bottle brush trees. Each time I walk past it, I stop and look to see if I need to move any to a better place. I couldn’t move it because none of the trees were attached yet. That was another thing I’ve been pondering . . . what would be the best way to attach them to the evergreen wreath? I knew hot glue would not be a wise choice, as there are many places behind some of the trees where there is nothing to glue to. As much as I fought the obvious choice of wiring each tree individually to the evergreen base, I really didn’t want to go to all that work! Yes, it took forever as each tree had to be wired in two places to hold them upright and secure. Also, the house had to be lit up. It came with lights, but you had to turn them on manually, and I don’t like to be bothered with that. I prefer to have them come on automatically with a timer, or to turn them on easily with a remote control. So, I removed the light mechanism in the bottom, thinking it would have a large hole for me to stuff a cluster of the firecracker lights up into. Sadly, that was not the case, so I ended up having to drill some holes to achieve the lighting of the inside of the house. A house is not a home unless it is filled with LIGHT! 😊
It's been a bit of a rough year for me. I woke up today feeling a little sad, which is not normal for me. Do you ever have those days where you wake up and there’s nothing wrong, but you just feel life is heavy? This was one of those days for me. Out of the blue, I received two texts and a phone call. I don’t believe in coincidences. These friends had no idea I was having a sad day, but I believe they were inspired to send the texts and make the phone call in the middle of their own busy days to let me know they were thinking of me, and that they loved me! I believe these tender mercies come from a loving Heavenly Father. I am blessed to be surrounded by kind and loving friends and family. My family circle is sadly small; however I have discovered that friends can fill the holes family members have chosen to leave. I am truly blessed to have friends who have become my family. On days like today, I think of ways to serve others. Today I not only finished the house in the middle of the bottle brush forest wreath for our home, but I also made a table centerpiece and another wreath for a client. Creating things of beauty brings LIGHT to our sad and heavy days. By the time I got to the wreath for our home, my heart felt happy again and filled with love and warmth.
My wish for you this week is to create a project you’ve been wanting to do for a long time. You may have one that you started but didn’t finish. If you still like it, pull it out of the box, finish it, and put it out to enjoy. If you don’t like it anymore, take it to the D.I. and let it go! Not only will you be able to finally cross that long forgotten project off your list, but you will bring LIGHT, beauty, and joy into your home. I hope your week is filled with creative joy that brings LIGHT into your soul.
Love Ya, Les 😊