Ideas for decorating with your vintage glass ornaments

Winter Wonderland

A christmas landscape in my cabinet.
It was featured in a Danish magazine last month.
I somehow miss it now, but it was made in august and I just couldn't keep it back then..

Gift Wrap Ideas

A few gift wrap ideas from a feature I did for a Danish magazne. I find it surprisingly dificult to come up with a whole series of different gift wrap ideas that will match, but not be just variants of the same theme. But this time around I found a method that seems to work. I started out looking for all matching papers in dark purple-redish shades in my stash. Then went for the accessories. Glass beads, pieces of jewlery, silk flowers, stickers, feathers.....anything as long as the colours were right. Then the ribbons seemed easy to find.

I made this wreath of heavy alu wire, thin wire, white feathers, white feather birds, silver ribbon and a bit of

box

Cotton Flower Wreath

This wreath is made of red branches, cotton flowers, spruce and thuja.

Christmas Craft Ideas: Piggy Ornaments

Pink or grey cardstock, old music sheet paper & metal wire for hanging

Christmas Craft Ideas: Ice Cranberry Lanterns

Christmas Craft Ideas: White Paper Doilie Cones

Round paper doilies folded to a cone, white flower ribon for handle

Christmas Craft Ideas: Squirrel Ornament

Sequins, a bit of wire and a squirrel from an old book glued onto cardstock. Oh, and a bit of glitter too.

Cristmas Craft Ideas: Snow Lanterns

Paper, paper lace, glue and sugar....

Tutorial for Newspaper Flowers

I was wondering if I should start blogging a bit again. I decided recently (I thought) to take a break and was so surprised to see it was two years since my last post! Wow, probably not one single reader left.

These pictures are from a story in a Danish magazine out there now. All ideas are based on news papers combined with other papers. Photos are by Jakob Valling.

I like the flowers most. At the bottom you can see kind of a tutorial photo if you want to give it a try.

I love to work with old book pages, sheet notes and news papers etc.

As soon as I had finished this photo session, I wanted to do one more. I just had too many ideas for this two page story. So I have asked traveling friends and collegues to bring home news papers from exotic countries. I'm so exited to see what it will bring.

Christmas Project # 15 - The Favorite, a Pegasus-Unicorn!

My son, aged 4, finally did a christmas ornament!

He creates about 100 animal sketches a day and it is impossible to make him change subject. So every time I asked him to do christmas stuff, he refused.

Until he got this idea himself. "Mummy, a pegasus has wings just like an angel. And we can decorate it with a corn so it becomes a Pegasus-Unicorn".

I cut it for him and was in control of gluing, he added the glitter.

Oh, I enjoy that ornament!

And if he wanted, he could make enough to cover that white branch we have. But nope, "no more", he says.

Christmas Project # 14 - Felt Stockings

I have a huge collection of ribbons. I love all of them and find great pleasure in matching them with fabrics. But, I find it very unsatisfatoctory to know that even if I start sewing and crafting with them now, I'll probably not have used them all by the time I'm 95! Unless..... I make a project that needs just a little bit from each!

This is how my stocking project started. After I made 50 different ones, I felt very contented and ....very ready for another project.

Christmas Projects # 13 Tags from Vintage Books. Or not?

Am I bad?

I'm not sure if I should post this or not.

But, let me confess: I make craft projects where I use pages from old books. Many projects. Very old books.

Like these tags with illustrations taken from a 150 years old book with descriptions of every major city and it's buildings in this country. Sheets are very thin, so I glue it to card board, cut it, decorate it with white paint and glitter and finally trim it with mat silver ribbon or tassel. I have a crush on these colours and textures together, sigh... And, ehm... pangs of conscience because I ruin this book.

My vague excuse is that this book was going to end its days in the waste bin. It belonged to an illustrator friend of mine. He was clearing up his studio and took this to an antiquarian who rejected it. Then asked me if I wanted it.

Christmas # 12 - We Want a White Christmas!

In this country we can never be sure to have a white christmas. So this year we captured a snowman, put him in a jar along with some snowy weather and secured with a lid. And voila: White Christmas!!

Christmas Project # 11 - Wallpaper Range

A stack of beautiful printet wallpaper from here made it into this series of cones (again, I must have at least 75 by now), woven hearts, paper covered boxes, cards and a bunch of tags made with my heart shaped puncher.

The photos are taken in my own kitchen and were published in a Danish magazine last month. I noticed that the magazine had retouched my wall tiles away. Hmmm, something to think about...

Christmas Project # 10 - Glass Ornaments

Whenever I see clear glass ornaments, my fingers are itching to decorate them.

These are painted with enamel paint and outlined with glitter. Of course.

Christmas Project # 9 - Cones

This project is actually from last year. However, I still do these cones as I really love the combination of antique book paper and the sparkling spangles! The cones are made of rectangular sheets , which give them a peak where I can add a handle. I think that way of making a handle, makes them hang more beautiful on the tree than if I make the side-to-side handles.

Oh, and the wooden tool in the front? I found it on a flea market. I'm not sure what it is for. Some says it's a gardeners tool, others that it is a confectioner's tool to make cornets for whipped cream. Anyone knows? Anyhow, it's a very helpful tool for folding paper cones. Productivity increased by 400% when I found that one.

Christmas Project # 8 Forrest Ornaments

These ornaments are made of cones with white acryllic paint on the leaves and an animal fastened with wire around the belly.

I snatched the critters from my son's drawer with literally hundreds of animals. But only as long as the photo shoot lasted. The morning after I made the ornaments, the hare and the pheasant were reported missing! And they are not even among his favorites at all. I still wonder how he knew..... I, of course promised to look for them and dismantled the ornaments right after photos were taken.

Christmas Project # 7 - Pixy Clogs?

Recently, I was asked to do a contribution to an international Christmas book. One of my first suggestions was to do something with red pixy clogs. And I was so surprised to be told that it wouldn’t work because pixies (and their clogs) are only a part of the Danish Christmas tradition. Really?? I had no idea!
Anyway, I had already made a few projects with them, so here are 3; a wreath, a badge and a candlestick. Tell me, is this completely strange for my - possible -non Danish readers??

Christmas Project # 6 - Captured Snowbird

This little bird is captured in a glass ball with painted snow dots. Bottom is filled with washing powder, a white painted twig is pushed through the hole and the bird is suspended from the lid.

Christmas Project # 5 - Bird Lantern

I guess Alicia’s cagelets inspired me when I wanted to decorate these lanterns.
I dotted them with white acrylic paint before adding a bit of ribbon, a bird, some toadstools (of course) and a twig of spruce. Right after the photo was taken, a smell of toasted/melted toadstools appeared. These candles where too big! Use small tea lights!!