50 Cent Shabby Pine Trees -Craft Tutorial (featured guest blogger)

Warning: addicting craft ahead!

Hello! I’m Robyn from the pink peony of le jardin (French for “the garden”)

http://thepinkpeonyoflejardin.blogspot.com/

You can expect daily posts from my blog chock full of decorating ideas, diy projects and tutorials, beautiful seasonal crafts, free downloads and photography lessons, special Sunday quotes, thrift store tips and finds, tried and true fabulous recipes, and much more! I have sold many of my creations in local boutiques and art fairs, and I will share my secrets of success with you for creating beautiful things!

I have a simple, inexpensive project to share with you today. I love to create, but like many of you, I don’t have a lot of time. Therefore, most of my projects are simple, nearly free, and have big impact. Such as my feature project of the day….50 CENT SHABBY PINE TREES! These trees are so easy and fun to make. I started with just one, and ended up with a little forest! They are so beautiful to display on their own, or in a grouping. And the best part is, you can leave them up all winter!~they are not necessarily Christmas decorations, but they can be.

Materials

scrap fabric~any kind will do. I used a sort of velvet looking one, and a satin one.

The white tree came from an old sheet! Isn’t it so shabby looking? Just look through your fabric stash

or find some old clothes to cut up!

black or white poster board

(Dollar Tree has poster board for 50 cents each)

about 1/4 yard of green or white fabric

tape

pencil

fabric scissors

Yardstick

hot glue gun

Steps:

1. Roll the poster board into a cone. Secure it with tape and a little hot glue.

2. With a yardstick, measure from the point of the cone to where you would like your base to be. My white pine tree measures 3/8th of a yard from the point, and my largest green tree measures 1/2 of a yard from the point. Draw an even line all the way around (measuring from the point as you go) with pencil or chalk. Then cut along that line to form the base of the tree.

3. Fold the fabric into 3 or so layers (to cut out 3 “u” shapes at a time). Begin by cutting a bunch of “u”‘s (circles with their tops cut off) Each should be the same size~ 2″x2″ for the white tree, and 2 1/2″ x 2 1/2 ” for the green tree. I cut out about 52 “u”s for the white tree, and 70 for the big green tree. You’ll be surprised at how quickly you can cut them out.

4. Hot glue just along the back of the top of the “U” and position it straight edge side up on the bottom of the cone. (Let about 1/4″ or so hang off the cone). Note: you will not be gluing the entire “u” down~just the top edge.

5. Overlap your first “U” with a second “U” (about 1/4″), and continue overlapping new pieces all around the bottom.

6. Carry on with the next row up. Your next piece should be centered over where the two below it meet. Also, you will want to over lap the bottom row by about 1/2″. None of these measurements have to be exact. You just want to make sure that the poster board is covered.

7. Continue slightly overlapping as you work your way up the cone until the tree is complete! When you get to the top, lay a piece horizontally on the point, fold down the edges around the point, and trim and hot glue as needed.

* If you want to make the little ribbon tree, follow the same instructions to make the cone, but start winding ribbon from the top of the cone and work your way down (hot gluing a dot of glue every couple of inches. It takes a lot of ribbon though, (maybe 3 or so yards)~which can be expensive. I already had the ribbon to play around with, so that is why I made one. I probably won’t make any more of those. I’ll just stick with making the fun, inexpensive shabby trees. I have an old green sweater that I might cut up to make another one! There are so many possibilities.

For more fun ideas come visit me at http://thepinkpeonyoflejardin.blogspot.com/

Thanks for having me Julia!

I love this! I was actually looking for something similar this week to learn how to make detractive Christmas tree cones and couldn’t find ones I like and then you go a head and do a beautiful tutorial for me here at Everyday Mom Ideas. Turns out you are not only a brilliant crafter but you are a mind read as well! Thanks so much for taking the time to do this! -Julia