Hi there!
The ever lovely Alice of Thoughts from Alice had this great idea – round up a group of bloggers who would all go to a thrift store, buy something for under $25, and transform it into a Christmas decoration. The point of which is to show that lovely Christmas decor doesn’t have to cost a small fortune.
I loved both the sentiment behind the idea and the challenge of making something pretty and Christmasy out of found items.
But……..well, I kind of cheated.
I kept meaning to stop by a thrift store and all of a sudden it was Tuesday, I had two days left, and knew I needed to pull something together. So I started thinking about the idea behind the challenge, the pretty decorations for less than a pretty penny. I was breaking down some cardboard boxes to put in the recycling bin and stopped with a piece in my hand as the idea to make a 3D Christmas star slowly came together in my head.
And it all kind of fell together from there. This project is definitely a work in progress – I’ll tell you about a few little issues I had and what I would do differently next time. I’m already thinking about taking this idea one or two steps further!
To make the star, I used a paper cutter to cut nine 3.5″ square pieces of cardboard. I drew a straight line from corner to corner and then used sharp scissors to cut each square into four equal triangles.
I separated the triangles into piles of three and used hot glue to attach each group of three into a pyramid.
Then I hot glued the pyramids together in the shape of a star.
After the glue had fully dried I spray painted the star first with gold spray paint and then with gold glitter spray paint.
Now here’s what I would do differently next time.
- Use something a bit more uniform than corrugated cardboard – either a solid cardboard or even mat board.
- I’d spray paint the pyramids before assembling them into a star – the star was really sturdy but the wetness or chemicals in the spray paint must have softened the glue and when I picked it up after the paint had dried, a bunch of pyramids fell off.
- I might try a different glue that would allow me to easily wipe away excess.
On an unrelated note, if you’re new around here, be sure to enter two fantastic giveaways I have going on right now – one for a Hoover Air Cordless Vacuum Cleaner (the new home tool love of my life), and the other for a collection of favorite things chosen by me and nine other bloggers, valued at over $300!
Now, you really must hop around and check out what everyone else did with their actual thrift store finds. It’s so good, you guys. So good.
