Take Advantage Of The Fallen Leaves This Fall
Nothings more sustainable than using what the earth already provides. Leaves and foliage make a great Thanksgiving center piece as well as wall art. Here are some ideas to get you started.
• Enhance an ordinary wooden tray with a scattering of fallen leaves. Cut a piece of colored art paper to fit the inside of a tray. Using pressed, preserved leaves, plan your design, dot each leaf with craft glue and press onto the paper. Place the paper on the bottom of the tray. To protect the design and the leaves from getting broken, place a piece of glass over the top. You can get a piece of glass cut to fit the tray size at any frame shop.
• Graphic leaf patters put a modern spin on the age-old art of framing pressed botanicals. Select frames of your choice. Take the glass out of the frame and trace outline on a piece of card stock. Arrange leaves as you like on the paper, dot each leaf with craft glue and press gently onto the paper. When throughly dry, put the frame back together and replace the glass. For a wreath pattern, draw and cut a circle from a piece of 1/8-inch thick cardboard, using a large bowl or other round shape as a tehmplate. Set a smaller bowl inside the circle and trace. Cut the inside shape out to a make a ring. Brush a thin layer of craft glue on the leaves and overlap them onto each other. Experiment with background papers in nature’s rich palette of earth tones.
• Give packages a woodsy flair by tying them up with twine or raffia topped with leaves. Try a mix of papers in seasonal hues. For gift boxes, wrap each box with paper and tie with twine, leaving enough for a bow. Make a fan of a few pressed, preserved leaves, and punch a hole where the stem meets the leaf. Thread the twine though, knot and trim the ends. For paper bags, punch holes at the bases of a few leaves, thread the twine through and tie. For bottles, cut a length of parchment paper slightly longer than the circumference of the bottle and as wide as the label you’ll be covering. Wrap the apper around the biottle, tie with twine and tuck the leaves underneath.
• Make pillar candles embellished with leaves the highlight of your tabel. Or arrange them on the mantel. Plan the leaf pattern on a flat surface. Brush a thin layer of craft glue onto each leaf and press onto pillar candles of various heights. Arrange the candles on a tray and surround with loose leaves.
• Nothing could be easier, or prettier, than setting a table dressed up for the season. Place leaves in a pattern for each plate, arrange a ring of leaves around the rim or dot the leaves across the plate as desired. Carfully place a glass plate of the same size as the bottom plate on top snadwishing the leaves between the two plates. Try colored glass plates, instead of clear, for an entirely different look.
•Instead of decorating with traditional greens, drape a favorite mirror, mantel or banister with a garland of leaves. Cut a piece of brown twine to desired length (6 feet gives you a good length to work with) and lay straight on a flat surface. Working form one end and using a hot-glue gun, sandwich the twine in between two leaves and secure with a dot of glue. Continue adding “leaf sandwiches” on the twine until the entire length of twine is covered. Vary color and variety of leaves. Secure the garland to a mirror or banister with glue dots. Glue dots are best so they won’t leave a mark when the garland of leaves are removed.
**Need tips on how to entertain a crowd of people? Over at Household Tips, Stephanie gives tips on how to achieve the perfect setting this holiday without going insane. Read her tips here.**
*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: If your shelves are overstuffed with books you have already read, check out Book Mooch, it’s a free service that helps you trade books with othes around the globe. You rack up points for each book you give away. Make a wish list and redeem your points when a book you want becomes available. And here’s the cool thing; Book Mooch has a list of charities it works with, so you can donate your points and share the literay wealth with someone in need.
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