Tuesday, December 13, 2016

Christmas Decor -- RV Style

Both Russell and I have said that it doesn’t feel like Christmas this year.  There hasn’t been a specific reason, other than we are out of our normal holiday routine and not around a lot of our friends and family, with whom we have created long standing traditions.  Part of it is also that Russell LOVES to bake Christmas cookies and make candies to give to friends, and here in the RV, baking on a large scale really isn’t an option.  I also think part of it is that we aren’t in a place where it snows very often.  In fact, yesterday it was 75 degrees here in Georgia.  Today though, as I write this, it is pouring down rain.  Go figure.  I think the final part of the equation why it doesn’t feel like Christmas to us is that we hadn’t decorated Coco for Christmas until last night.

I have had a Christmas wreath hanging up since Thanksgiving.  The wreath I made for the RV was very simple and light weight, but I think it has a big impact.  It is a foam wreath base that I purchased at a big-box craft store and wrapped in a roll of 45’ of garland.  (Yes, I used ALL 45’ for the 12” wreath base.)  Then I cut out various snowflakes using Close to My Heart’s Snow Flake Thin Cuts (No longer available because they were so popular) and white glitter paper and just attached them to the wreath with my hot glue gun.  I used some white ribbon to hang the wreath on our closet door.  Again, it is very simple, but has a big impact.


We hadn’t bothered with putting up our tree until we got to Georgia, although we had planned ahead for the holidays and brought our 2’ artificial Christmas tree with us on the journey.  Our meager little tree has been waiting patiently in a compartment underneath the coach since we left Reno to be able to come out and make its appearance, and last night, it finally did.   We had intentionally waited to put it up.  If we set it up too early, we would need to put it away every time we moved from one location to the next, and why risk all the decorations falling off whenever we turned a corner.  So yesterday, out it came, now that we are parked through Christmas.

The tree is decorated with a strand of fake lights, and a silver star on top that I have had for a long while.  It also has a set of ornaments that I purchased years ago that I love because it is a miniature nativity scene complete with shepherds, the kings, sheep, camels and of course, Baby Jesus.  Lastly, the tree is decorated with ornaments I made using Close to My Heart’s Base and Bling crafting line.  Last year’s Holiday Expression Catalog/Idea Book included a set of Christmas stickers that fit perfectly into both the square and round pendants. I used them in each of the 32 ornaments I created and instead of putting them on a chain to wear as a necklace, as they were intended, I put them on ornament hooks and hung them on the tree, along with some of the charms that coordinated with them.  They are the perfect size for our little tree and the white Christmas lights that we have running along the dash board underneath the tree, glimmer on the glass of the pendants.  It actually is very pretty.



For the RV, I also created a paper garland of stamped paper ornaments.  This was made using Close to My Heart’s Stamp of the Month that was available in October.  I stamped and colored each of the bells, stockings, stars and gifts, cut out coordinating shapes in various colors of glitter paper to back them and strung them on some ribbon, which has been hung in the RV.  Again, simple, lightweight, but a big impact with our two tiny stockings hung on each end.



I still have one more project I want to try out that I saw on Pinterest… maybe I’ll get to it this afternoon, and if I do, I’ll add those as well and post about them later… I need to pull out my Cricut machine and I don’t feel like going out in the rain right now, so it will have to wait and you will have to stay tuned.

So until next time, and more crafting decorations,
Roberta

The Traveling Crafter 

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