A lesson on creating a paper Christmas tree......

I was out shopping at my most favorite store, Anthropologie, and I saw a wonderful Christmas tree created out of cut papers.  I left inspired with the thought..."I can do that!"   And so I did....and it's easy!    Here are photos of how I did it so you can make one too!  Wishing a Merry Christmas to all who read my blog!

First find a base.   I went to the hardware store and picked up some furniture sliders.  But now that I think of it, you could just form a base with foil, then cover the foil with apoxie sculpt and stick your dowel into it.  Glue to secure.

The tree at Anthropologie was made with French papers and I happened to have an old French dictionary, so I used those pages...but you could use any paper.  Old magazines, wrapping paper, old letters....any paper.

At the hardware store I picked up some thin wooden sticks.  I guess you could use a pencil too.

Get some scissors that will cut with a patterned edge.  Any craft store will have these.

Anyone whose taken my online classes knows that I LOVE apoxie sculpt!   I used this to cover my base...both top and bottom and sides.  Mix the two parts together really well and remember to add water to your fingers so it doesn't get too sticky. If you don't have apoxie sculpt, you could add a bead in between each page as long as the hole was large enough to thread onto the stick.  Or....you could even make a bead of foil and secure it around the stick, between the papers with some instant glue.

I then dusted the apoxie covered base with some gold metallic powders.....and then I stamped in a pattern.  You can find rubber stamps in any craft store, or use something around your home.

Here are photos of the pages I used.  I took about 5 pages from my dictionary and then folded those in half, making ten pages, and then cut them into a square shape.  Keep in mind that larger squares will be on the bottom and they will get smaller as they go up the tree.

Make a hole in the middle of your stack of paper and thread those onto the stick that you have glued onto your base.  In between each piece of paper I made a small ball of apoxie and pressed that around the stick.  This gives space between each paper and branch of the tree.

Keep cutting your squares of paper, smaller as you go up the tree, and thread onto the dowel and then add your separating ball.  Twist the paper so they each are in a different angle.

Go up the dowel as far as you wish and then leave about an inch more of the wood before you cut the rest of the dowel off.  Make it as high as you wish it to be.

When I decided it was high enough, I  glued a star on top and pressed some apoxie sculpt to cover around the top of the stick and then I pressed micro beads into the apoxie.  You could use anything you wanted on top...even making a ball or star out of the apoxie sculpt.

I got out some glitter and matte medium ( you could use glue also).  I painted the matte medium on some edges of the paper and then sprinkled the glitter on to the glue.

I ran out of glitter but found some irridescent confetti in my supplies, so I painted on more matte medium and sprinkled that onto the edges of the tree and onto the top point. When the glue was all dry, I sprayed a sealer on to make sure the confetti stuck.

And there you have a really cool tree!   I love this Christmas tree!  Now I'm going to gather the grandgirls together and they can each make one for their mom.  Our Christmas project!

Happy Creating!
Marilyn :)