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.

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.

Finally got the rest of the ornament photographs processed.  Here are the rest of the 2014 ornaments I gave for Christmas this past year.  These two beaded chandeliers went to a co-worker's daughters.  Each year they have received a Pink or Purple ornament.
 

Was getting tired of the pearl teardrops so I changed to fluted metal teardrops and switched to 3mm pearls in lieu of the metal beads.

Additional spools that I gave.  Large snowflake:

 

Small snowflake:

 

Additional 2 Mickey Mouse ornaments:

Small ornaments which were given as a set:

 

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.