Elves

Need a special hostess gift? Want to dress up your counter or bar? Or do you just feel like doing a fun craft project?

Can’t tell you how many of these sold at shows this holiday season. Crazy! But they are cute. And easy and fun to make. And, of course, the thought of a bunch of little elves running around the place made me smile. 🙂

And, they are what they say, “easy peasy”.

You can easily make a pattern for them from looking at the picture. A long triangle and then the little piece for the beard. And you can adjust the beard piece to your liking.

You will need old sweaters, I got mine from Goodwill. Wash and shrink them. Wool ones really do work best but if you are short on wool ones like I was, then an acrylic one will work

You will also need the fur for the beard. There is an assortment of fur available at JoAnnes Crafts and Fabrics store. Small sized metallic fur balls can be found at Michaels and the little wooden plugs may be found at your local hardware store, Menards, or Home depot.

Assembly is easy. Take a beard and center it on the straight end of the hat on the wrong side. Zigzag across the entire edge..

Next, sew together the long sides creating a point. Now this is where I thought it might be a pain but wasn’t. You turn it inside out. I thought it might be a little difficult because it is such a small point, but I guess beacause of the stretchy material it turned quite easily.

Using a glue gun, I attached the wooden plug right below the hat centering it on the beard. And I also used a glue gun to fasten the metallic fur ball to the point of the hat.

Voila! You have your elf!

Ornaments and Trimming Beards

So what do ornaments and trimming beards have in common? Well, the main thing is that they are items that I am creating for a Holiday Market in Naperville put on by Room 363. Indeed it is that time of year. And, shamefully, I am one of the few people glad to see the Christmas items on display in stores. Terrible, right? You see that preparing for a holiday show does not happen overnight. And I had a few ideas in mind but it involved using some Christmas themed items that were not readily available. For instance there is a certain color green tissue paper that I wanted to use for ornaments. I looked everywhere I could think of that sold giftwrapping. Then about the time I was about to forget that particular color I went into JoAnne Fabrics. They had put out a fair amount of Christmas decor and lo and behold there was just what I was looking for! With a sigh of relief I knew then that I would indeed be able to complete what I had just begun, and with time to spare.

The elves are what I call Wine Elves. They are a nice little touch when taking a gift of wine for the hostess of the get together that you are going to for the holidays. It just slips onto the top of the bottle. Dresses it up a little doesn’t it?

I really enjoyed working on the ornaments. I’m including some photos of them during the process. Easy enough to do, although a little messy with the glitter and all.

Using styrofoam balls (I used the larger ones), loosen up Elmer’s glue with a little water and “glue” on about 3″ torn sheets of a tissue paper that you want to use. I used 3 colors.

Let dry. A good way to do this is to poke screws through foamcore and then press the balls onto the screws like in the photos.

When dry brush on a thin coat of the glue mixture and then sprinkle with crystal glitter. Let dry again. This is the messy part…..I try to brush off as much loose glitter as possible at this point.

Using about a 5/8 ribbon wrap it around the ornament twice and tie a standard bow. (This can be a little tricky depending on the ribbon you used.) Next I hot glued some little gold berries to the top. You could use acorns for a nature feeel.

Voila!

Like I said, it is a little messy, but this could make a nice little gift couldn’t it? Or maybe you would just like it to dress up your own tree.

Enjoy your day! ( I’ve been battling a really bad cold this week and looking for some relief!)
Doris