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.

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.

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.

It's THAT time of year again.

Guess what time it is? It's FLUFFING TIME. Michael's have their miniature trees out and I have bought four (so far), that's right four miniature trees that I will be fluffing out and trimming to start lighting and decorating. Possibly five, I have to excavate the closet but I think I have one in there. I have lots of beads which will be turned into miniature ornaments over the next couple of weeks. Already have some new designs I want to try along with some of last year's designs still being used. Most likely one tree will be Rainbow, another tree to be white-clear-gold, another silver-clear-blue. 

Updated 2013.09.12:

Here are a few of the miniatures I have designed for this year's mini trees.

These are made from mesh beads with glass rondelles being used to reduce the size of the openings in the mesh beads.  To get additional ornaments from the designs, I added the dangle of a Clear AB teardrop.  Traditionally, I will have the teardrop with the tapered end pointing downward.

Wholesale Gem & Jewelry show

On July 26th, I drove 2.5 hours (150 miles) into North Carolina to attend the wholesale jewelry show in Franklin.  It is held twice a year, Mother's Day weekend and the last weekend in July.  Both weekends there are about 5 gem shows but I only go to the wholesale show.  I got back from spending more money than I should have, but it did feel good. Got lots of beads and necklaces which will be made into Christmas ornaments. Got peridots, emeralds, sapphires, and amethysts to be made into earrings for various and sundry people. One of my co-workers asked me to pick something up for his girlfriend, found a sterling silver flip-flop with rubies across the bands and a swiss blue topaz pendant. Picked up 2 dozen plus earrings in a wide selection of styles and colors for another co-workers young daughters.  Now they can go to school stylin'.

Picked up mesh beads in both globe and oblongs, in silver and gold.  The globes are 12mm and the oblongs I was able to pick-up in 2 different sizes an 8x12mm and a 12x24mm.  Also picked up several silver and rhinestone beads, again in two sizes.  Some silver spiral cages, again in two sizes.  Stopped by one tent and picked up more of the marblized wooden beads from Indonesia in a wide assortment of colors.  I stopped by the vendor tent where I had picked-up three different sizes of what they call "disco beads", globes with rhinestones bumps.  They had 2 strands of white which I picked-up in May from them, but they said if I called their home location in Miami, they would still sell them to me at the show price and would ship free.

Once I separate the beads, I'll start making ornaments.  Lots and lots of miniature ornaments.  One woman told me to make several of the miniature trees and she would sell them for me to some of her clients.  So when I start making the ornaments, I'll need to keep track of with beads and various supplies I use to come up with a cost for the tree.  Then triple the cost of the tree to cover my time.  Just need to find more of the miniature trees with small 'needles'.  Have lots of the miniature lights and can get them locally so as I need them I can go out and buy a strand or two.

Going further down the “Miniature Rabbit Hole”

Several weekends ago, I went to my favorite wholesale show for gem and jewelry.  I found several strands of beads which reminded me of some of the beads I used on the miniature trees I made in 2012.  If you are trying to make the tree “to scale”, beads make great ornaments.  Many of the beads I use are 6mm (1/4") to 20mm (5/8"), which if you are wanting the 2 foot tree to be scaled to an 8 foot tree, then these beads would appear to be 24mm (about 1") to 80mm (3-1/4").  Since I also add at least two additional 3mm beads to almost every miniature ornament, you can add an additional inch to the apparent scaled size.

While glass beads have an inner ‘glow’ or ‘life’ to them, they also have weight.  The finishes available to the glass beads are much more vibrant, reflex light and have a wider range.  For the most part, a glass bead and a plastic (sometimes known as acrylic) the same size, the glass will weight considerably more.  When you will be adding almost 200 ornaments, weight should come into consideration.

Some of the beads I use have larger holes.  Solutions to this can be as simple as using a bead cap and additional beads inside to fill the hole.  I have several beads which have made great ornaments but the hole was larger than 1mm.  I usually use a 3mm beads on the bottom and top of the ornaments and when you have a larger hole the bead will sit down on the 3mm, or even won’t even stop to notice and fall off the headpin.  With beads with 1-4 mm holes, on the headpin I will put the traditional 3mm bead, a bead cap, then put on several smaller beads which will slide inside the hole of the larger bead.  Using these extra beads take up some of the room in the hole, thereby stabilizing the bead.  If the beads are transparent, I have used clear silver lined Delicas®, silver 2.5mm beads, or clear silver line bugle beads.  If the beads are hollow like the corrugated metal beads, I use the soft plastic ear nuts at the top and bottom to act as stabilizers and help center the bead on the head pin.  I prefer using the ones that look like little hats as I can cut the excess off.

I went browsing through one of the local bead store at the beginning of June and the store had a “bargain bin” of beads that they were trying to clear out.  I knew I shouldn’t have browsed, but I did and ended up buying a few packets (13) of beads.  Almost everyone of these will be used in making miniature ornaments.  Some will be finished just by adding some chain, or maybe a linked gold bead if I can find a gold which matches.  The bead shop had more of these beads, and I will most likely be heading back soon to ‘clean them out’ of certain beads.  I have found over the years, that if you find a limited quantity, better to buy as many as you can afford, as you will find the next time someone has beat you to it and you will never find them again.  This has been learned from experience.
The black and white squares are ½”, ¼” and ⅛”, the entire block is 2" x 3".  Most likely the spikes or daggers will be used as icicles, attach a piece of chain and maybe a beaded link for the small spike.

The mesh beads will have a clear earnut inserted into each end and covered with a bead cap.  The last time the store also had several different sizes of the mesh beads available in different anodized colors: pink, light blue, dark blue, silver, red, bright green, bronze and purple.

"Everyone Deserves a Christmas Tree" or "My Trip Down the Minature Rabbit Hole"

After Thanksgiving several years ago, I was eating at one of my favorite local restaurants in Greensboro, NC, I asked the waiter if he had his tree up yet.  He told me that he did not, and that most likely he wouldn’t due to space and the time putting up and then having to take down the tree.  As I drove home, I was bothered and I kept on thinking ‘Everyone deserves a Christmas tree.’

Over the next few days I decided I would make a miniature tree for him, fully lit and decorated so all he had to do was plug the tree in.  I found a 24 inch tree at one of the local craft stores.  The tree have ‘needles’ about 0.50" long and about 50 branches.  I found several packs of battery powered ‘rice’ lights, along with a 35 bulb strand of LED lights, and I started to work.

I took the wrapping from around the bottom and secured the tree base to a 12x12x0.625" piece of plastic cutting board.  Fluffing the tree branches out to give an appearance of a ‘natural’ tree, I started securing the lights to the branches with small pieces of 26 gauge floral wire.  Just like larger trees, it is best to have the lights on when doing this.  The LED lights were a ‘cool white’ with a bluish tint and very bright, so I positioned them along the trunk of the tree.  With the long ‘needles’ and fluffed branches a gentle cool glow would be emitted from the center of the tree.  Next I positioned the battery-powered ‘rice’ lights.  Dividing the tree into quarters, I strung the lights along the branches, wiring them into place, one bulb per branch near the tip.  Each pack of ‘rice’ lights had 20 bulbs so I had a few left over when I reached the longer, lower branches.  The ‘rice’ lights gave off a ‘warm white’ light.

 

















 

After the tree was lit, I started the ornaments.  I had decided when I started I would want the ornaments to be ‘in scale’ with the tree, so for a 2-foot tree the scale would be 1:4 if most trees are around 8-foot.  Most globes on trees are between 65mm to 80mm (2.5" to 3.25"), so the globe ornaments would need to be between 15mm to 20mm and any ‘fancy’ ornaments no larger than 2" in length.  Many of the ornaments were simple beads on head pins with bead caps and 3mm metal beads on beginning and ending the assembly.  A simple loop at the end and the ornament was done. 

 





Many of the ‘fancy’ ornaments were created in similar fashion except many did not have the bead caps.  Teardrop glass beads, graduated faceted beads as well as druks (smooth beads) were used to create miniature ornaments to be utilized in filling out the tree.

When I was at the wholesale show earlier that year, I had bought several dozen pair of earrings.  Since I get much of my inspiration from jewelry, I decided to use the dangle earrings as ornaments.

  

















 




Because of the long needles, I needed the ornaments to be lower than the needles to swing freely.  To remedy this I used small pieces of chain to suspend the ornaments, freeing them from the needles and used ring sized Memory Wire as ornament hooks.

After putting the tree topper on the tree, the total height was 30 inches.  Knowing I didn’t want to have to take the ornaments off the tree to box everything up, I made a box around the tree.  “Gator Foam” are sheets of PVC, and having ‘dumpster dived’ at a friends plastic company I had plenty of scrap, some as large as I needed.  Using Duct tape, I was able to construct a container which could be lifted off over the tree.  I wrapped a piece of the PVC to act as the bottom of the box and using double-sided carpet tape I secured the tree base to the piece of PVC.  I wrapped the rest of the box, made a bow and carefully placed the present in my car for delivery.

With the help of the manager of the restaurant, I was able to turn on the battery powered lights, put the top of the box over the tree and sneak into the restaurant and placed the tree on the waiter’s open table.  When he started lifting the top off, the light started spilling from the gap.  The restaurant was rather dark and the light drew everyone’s attention.  From several tables I heard “oooh”s and “aaaah”s and the waiter was speechless.  When he regained his composer he asked me why I did it, and I simple told him “Everyone deserves a Christmas tree.”  We took the tree over to the bar and plugged in the LED lights and I went back to the table to have a very good meal.  Many of the customers and employees at the restaurant wanted to know where I had bought the tree.  When I told them I had made most of the ornaments, several asked if I could make one for them and how much would I charge them.  Having no idea how much I spent in time and materials, I declined to name a price.

Since then, I have continued to give him a set of new ornaments for the tree each year.  This year I will most likely have to give him a new tree, as all the ornaments are getting very crowded on one tree.  He has told me, he still has the box I made, and keeps the tree inside until November 1st when he pulls out “his” tree and it sat on either the coffee table or dining table.  He will keep the tree out until January 1st when he turns off the lights, puts the box back over the tree and places it back into storage.

Last year, I made two additional miniature trees, one for charity the other for a co-workers wife, and both were well received.  The tree I used (and will continue to use as long as I can) have shorter ‘needles’ with more branches and concrete bases.  To widen the base, I use pint take-out soup containers and fill the base with gluing compound until it covers the base.  Continuing to use a mixture of AC and DC powered lights, I will attach lights with pieces of floral wire.  I have found 50-light strands of AC powered ‘rice’ lights and I will put 4 packs of the 20-light strands of DC-powered lights.  Using the same techniques as before, I make miniature ornaments for the tree.  The trees last year had 130 lights and over 180 miniature ornaments.