2015 Ornament Exchange - the main exchanges

This year's major Exchange Ornaments have been sent out.  These are the major annual exchanges which I have to make multiple ornaments.  I try to make the same ornament for each member of the assigned group instead of separate ornament designs for each individual.

I was a member of two different groups who held handmade ornament exchange this year.  The first group, I needed to make a total of eight (8) ornaments, four in each group and I asked for two groups. Most (maybe missing one) have received their ornament so I feel better about posting a photo of the ornament at this time. I had a mother in one group and her daughter in the other group, who both live together, so I made the second ornament so they wouldn't have two ornaments the same on the tree.

Main ornament

Variant ornament

Many years ago, I had gone to the After Christmas sales looking at the various ornaments which were greatly discounted.  I happened upon several containers of miniature glass onion globe ornaments, three colors with eight ornaments per color in each container.  I picked up all they had (seven containers: 3 of white, red & green ornaments and 4 of bronze, gold & copper ornaments).  I had forgotten about them and discovered them again last year.  Still have many of them available for future ornaments, and will most likely use them for many personal gifts for this year.  The white is actually close to an antique pearly white which matched the pearl drops and pearl beads very close in color.  The smaller Delica beads I use on the arcs/arms were a close match as well.  If I decide to do these as my major design I can easily change the color the the Delica beads to match friend's individual likes such as one friend likes orange so I will do an orange and pearl and a friend's daughters like pink and purple while his will be deep red and his wife's will be classical pearl white.

The other exchange I was a member of this year, I had to make seven (7) identical ornaments, then send them to the coordinator who will redistribute them to the participants.  I like this concept as only the people who send in ornaments will receive ornaments in return and they come all at the same time.  For this exchange I created a beaded icicle with pearls, rhinestone rondells and bi-cones.  I have seen a similar ornament on Pinterest which I liked.  I changed a few things, deleting an additional embellishment of 'caging' the top pearl which additional pearls and bi-cones and adding additional spacer beads separating the individual elements.

2015 Second Qtr Exchange/May 2015 Recycled Exchange

The 2015 Second Quarter Ornament Exchange, along with the May 2015 Recycled Ornament Exchange, were basically the same.  Had several sets of the miniature spool snowflake ornaments left over from 2014 Christmas, so I re-worked them to include a snowflake charm dangle. 

The charms I had purchased in 2009 as part of a lot of costume Christmas bracelets/keychains which I disassembled.  The charms were varied, some simple snowflakes others were holly leaves, Santas, presents, stockings, etc. and simple beads.

The small spools had to have the central wire re-worked from a headpin and plain bottom to a eyepin which ran the entire way through the ornament and gave an attachment loop for the charm.

Getting into the Christmas Spirit (or at least trying to)

It is getting closer to Christmas and I am getting in the mood to start making ornaments.  Been looking at various pieces of jewelry on Pinterest.  As stated before, many of my ornament ideas come from pendants, earrings and other pieces of jewelry, especially if I am designing ornaments for a miniature tree.  Sometimes, the piece can be enlarged to “normal” ornament size just by increasing the size of the beads, other times not and the enlarged ornament will need to be re-worked to include the additional use of beads.  With an increase in the number of beads, also comes the increase in weight from the additional supplies.

Thinking about doing more of the wooden spool ornaments from last year, already have eight designs for people who are fans of the University of Alabama, and my godson will be ‘graduated’ from Mickey to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles which have been designed to make four different ornaments.

Over the years several people have received miniature trees from me and I have about four (4) 2-foot trees in storage that I thought about making with the possibility of selling.  Usually each tree has 80 to 130 mini lights on them mixing both battery-powered as well as outlet, usually will use white lights.  I will put about 100 miniature hand-made ornaments, 25 different styles with four ornaments placed around the tree.  Most of the ornaments will be between 0.5 inch and 2 inches in height so that the ornaments are in scale with the tree.  The first tree I made 10 years ago, had over 40 pairs of earrings mixed in with the miniature ornaments.  Since then, I have been on the look-out for earring designs which I can make as miniature ornaments.

Have many old designs of miniatures from past years which I already have extra ornaments hanging up and have ‘discovered’ several more that can easily be turned into miniature ornaments.  So the new trees would have enough variation of ornaments so each tree won’t look a-like.   I try to make four of each design so that one can be placed on each quarter of the tree with two of them placed on the top half and two on the bottom half.

The only thing on the tree I usually don’t make is the tree topper, I will purchase a pre-made miniature topper but will add elements to it.

First Exchange for 2015

With a New Year starts a new rotation of individual quarterly exchanges: February-April; May-July and August-October.  For this quarter’s exchange, I decided to use some of the ornaments left over from 2014 Christmas.  Many of the ornaments I made used wooden spools, painted with finger nail lacquer and I used scrap-booking paper (along with paper I designed).  I decided to add another element to the left over ornaments, to create a new design.  Several years ago, I purchased a gross of various Christmas jewelry which had lots of Christmas themed charms.

The tools I used to make the new ornaments.

Here’s a shot of the elements used in the ornaments.  Inside the spindle hole I used 6mm faux pearls to help stabilize the ornament, preventing it from sliding back and forth on the 20 gauge wire.  Went though and replace the head-pin with an eye-pin which allowed the dangle to be attached.  Had four different charms, with four different colored spools.

 All four finished re-purposed ornaments.

The ornaments will be mailed to Nova Scotia later this week.

New Ornament Style - Wooden Spools

I have lots of variations on the decorating the wooden thread spools over the past year, so I thought I would do some for Christmas 2014.  I used finger nail lacquer to paint the spools, usually it took three coats, so it isn’t an ornament to make in an evening, but you can ‘assembly line’ the process by having several spools being made at a time.  I used both the medium and large wooden spools available through many craft stores.

I was also able to customize the spools using both scrap-booking paper and searching images on the internet.  I few I had to use my Graphic Design background by taking a couple of elements, such as the houndstooth background and over laying the Alabama “A”.  Still have a few to go, but here are the ones which have been photographed and edited.

The Alabama ornaments will be going to several friends who are fans.

The Mickey Mouse ornaments will be going to my latest god-child who just turned 2.  Have four (4) but need to re-take the red spool as well as the white spool.

 The Minions will be going to another friend who loves them.

The red spool with the musical notes on pine colored paper were sent out to one of the ornament exchange groups I am a member of.  Original was going to send the holographic gold large spools, but I forgot them at the office so I substituted the red spools.  I also have green spool with crimson paper.

The Ren & Stimpy ornaments are going to the mother of my god-child while his father will be one set of the Alabama spools.

The Doctor Who spools are for a friend who enjoys the Matt Smith years.

Still to go are some snowflake spools, both large and small.  These will be done on spools painted white and light blue.  The metal connectors will be silver-toned and I have some small snowflakes which will dangle from the bottom.

Getting back in the saddle

Aside from making the recycled icicles (previous post), I was finishing my "Pay It Forward" gifts, each person who agreed to "Pay It Forward" received a set of miniature dangles made with rhinestone rondelles, glass teardrops, metal beads and beadcaps.

There were ten colors of rondelles and I was lucky enough to find seed beads in a close match to the rhinestones.  Small and delicate enough for a miniature tree, the over all length was around 3 inches.

I also had a contest to name the person portraying Santa in the photo I am using as my Facebook cover photo.  The first person to correctly identify him would receive something during the year.  The received a set of pearl dangles which were around 5 inches tall.  Another good size for a miniature tree or could be used on a regular sized tree.

It has been awhile, but I have been busy: ICICLES and dangles

One of the Ornament Exchanges for this quarter was "Recycled".  Here are images of my final ornaments.  Where I work we have expanded stainless steel grating which we use as protective covers for the Water Recirculators we make.  There are pieces of scrap which I have de-burred and fashioned into various lengths.  I bent the top of each to form a hanging hook.

The base coating is another recycled product from work.  Another part of the company I work for in cutting protective lens from plastic sheeting, Polycarbonate and PET-G.  When cut on the saw, the resulting sawdust is a nice snowy white.  Using E6000 epoxy, I glued the plastics sawdust to both sides of the metal, allowed to dry and then using spray adhesive I applied large flake glitter, regular glitter and then micro-fine glitter to the surface.

This is a piece of the mesh.  I had one of the mechanist to shear the initial pieces into long wavy strips.  I then used the grinding stone to take any sharped metal off.

I had other ornaments I needed to make for other commitments.  Each year, I will do a "Pay It Forward" campaign on Facebook.  People sign up and commit to also "pay it forward" in that sometime in the year, you will make something hand-made and send to the person along with a handwritten note.  This year, the people will receive miniature Christmas ornaments made from glass teardrops, rhinestone rondelles, bead caps, metal beads, wire and Delica beads.  I had 10 different colors of the rondelles: Clear AB, Red, Lime Green, Emerald Green, Aqua Blue, Medium Blue, Sapphire Blue, Purple, Root Beer and Smoke Topaz.

There was another 'contest' on my Facebook page to identify the person dressed in the Santa outfit.  The image came from the up coming movie "I Am Santa Claus" which stars WWE wrestler Mick Foley.  The person who correctly identified him will be receiving the four dangles pictured below.

4/52 ornament

As alluded to in previous post, I did a white and gold version (two actually) of the red onion with pearls and white onion with pearls and opaque black seed beads.  I have several more colors of the miniature ornaments plus a couple dozen of miniature stylized Christmas tree ornaments along with frosted pine cones.

Ornaments #2 and #3 for 2014

I had the 'spike' ornaments for several years.  I have them in red, green, blue and purple.  Wanted to carry the swag motif from the miniature ornaments to the entire ornament.

This is the ornament that I am giving an internet friend for his birthday, February 5th.  It will be going into the post this afternoon.  He likes the black/white/gold color combination and most (if not all) ornaments he has received from me are in this combo.

Currently working on the above but using white opal instead of opaque black.  Have one finished and half way through a second.  The white will be for the 1st Quarter ornament exchange at ChristmasOnramentCrafters under the YAHOO! groups.

Other ornaments from Christmas 2013

Most of the Christmas gifts I give are handmade beaded ornaments done in various colors of beads.  Occasionally I will more than one, especially if the gift is going to a couple or family.  The following are photos of ornaments which were given during the 2013 Christmas season.

These were not only the Exchange ornaments I used but were also a set given to my younger sister in NC.

The red ones were also given to my younger sister.

Another set went to a co-worker and his family.  The Dark Red (not shown) to the father as he likes Alabama, the wife received the White, oldest daughter Purple and youngest daughter Pink.

Most of the other ornaments given followed the designs below but in various colors.  The Suspended Chandelier (left) also was done in White, Blue, Orange, Rainbow, Light Blue and Ivory.  The regular Chandelier (right) was done in White, Light Blue, Rainbow.

 

I also did a few variations on the Exchange ornaments in Blue with Silver beads.

First Ornament of 2014

When I was in NC for Christmas, I found 14 dozen miniature ornaments which I had purchased several years ago.  There are 6 colors of the onion-shaped glass ornaments.  Using the red ornament I have just finished this ornament.  The ornament is 8.5" tall and 2.75" across.  Other colors are bronze, gold, pale gold, olivine green and snowy white.

Thought about using red glass beads instead of the pearls, but I don't have corresponding glass beads for the other colors.  By using the pearls, I can give several as a gift and they will look as if they are a set.  The small seed beads I use will match the onion ornament and I've incorporated them on the dangles

Poodle's miniatures for 2013

Eight years ago I gave my first miniature tree to a person who said they were not planning on having a tree.  One the way home, I thought “Everyone deserves a Christmas tree.” and I made my first mini tree which stands 33 inches tall.  The first tree had 50 mini lights for outlet and 80 battery-operated mini lights, 36 pairs of earrings, and over 100 handmade ornaments no longer than 2 inches.  Each year I gift another set of handmade miniature ornaments.  This is the set for 2013.

Last night, I made an old woman cry.

Yesterday, after work I stopped by a local craft store and picked up a miniature tree skirt, found a container that I could slip over the cement base of the miniature tree and packed about 2 inches of plastic snow in it.  I delivered the 1-ft tall last night.  I stopped by my co-workers home and called his mother to come over with the ruse that his wife needed her help.  We sit the tree up on the kitchen table, turned on the battery packs and waited for his mom to walked from next door.  Totally surprised her when she walked into the kitchen.  Her son told her the tree was from "Daddy" and he pointed out the cookie ornament to 'prove' it.

We told her that last year, I was asked by Cookie, if I would make a tree for her.  She kept saying she was very happy and didn't want anything else for Christmas.  I showed her where the battery packs were and that she would need 16 AA batteries.  I then turned to her grand-daughters and told them batteries would be a good idea for stocking stuffers.  She took photos of the tree and started sending them out to her friends.  Later, the son carried the tree to her house and sat it beside the urn containing his father's ashes, which I have been told is where it will stay.

Good deed accomplished, now to make more Christmas ornaments to continue spreading the season.

2013 Miniature Tree

Almost finished with the tree. Just have to finish the bottom, rise the tree an inch or two and wrap a skirt around to hide the battery packs and straighten the star. Has 80 miniature rice lights, swagged garland has silver feathers and spike alternating between connection points. 54 enameled charms, pearl drops and globes, AB white and Silver 'disco' ball ornaments, a cookie ornament in memory of Chuck's father "Cookie".

The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men

Even though I went out and bought supplies for 4 miniature trees and then decided I wanted a year off, after making two last year in less than 3 months, I was asked by a co-worker to-day (11.13.2013) and I couldn't refuse. I made the second miniature tree last year which was given to his wife. She adored it and has refused to allow it to be put up. She told me that she and her mother-in-law would lie in the dark with the tree lights aglow. I stopped back by their house last Christmas to see her what she thought and Chuck's father commented that both he and his wife couldn't believe I made the tree.

In late July of this year, Chuck's father passed away and Chuck asked me today if I would consider making a tree for his mother so she could set it beside the urn containing his father's ashes. Chuck wanted to know if I could make a smaller tree, as the 32" tree I gave his wife would be too big. I purchased a 16" tree and have fluffed the branches. The next step will be trimming some of the branches to make the tree more symmetrical. After turning down the top ‘branch' the tree is just over a foot tall.

 For lighting, I could put two outlet powered strands or five sets of battery-operated, 20 bulbs per strand. I am thinking about using only battery operated lights for this tree. I then remembered I have a bunch of Christmas charms I haven't used in four years from bracelets, key-chains and ear-rings I bought at the wholesale show back in 2009. I have 24 different designs that I will re-purpose as ornaments. The collection has presents, 5 different snow-flakes, holly, stocking, candy canes, reindeer head and wreath, snowmen and 6 different Santas. Thinking about using up to six of each although I have only 2, 3,or 4 of maybe half of the designs. I should over a hundred charms which I will use, and since the charms are silvered finished, I will be using silver-plated findings instead of my traditional gold-toned.

There will be fill-in ornaments from white pearls, and maybe some other jewelry accessories but nothing over 1.5 inches though. From another shopping trip I have some silver-plated rhinestone sprays which I will add as sparkle and maybe I can find some rhinestone chain in silver-finish I can use as garland. I will set everything aside for the next week to work on this tree, trying to get it done before heading to North Carolina on the 22nd.

The ornaments for gifts to friends and family are almost done, have about 6 left to do, plus a set of miniatures for the first miniature tree I gave to a friend. Some will be mailed around Thanksgiving, others given out while I'm in NC at Christmas, and more after my return but before the 12 Days of Christmas are up.