Snowflake Crafts and Painting on Fabrics
Snowflake crafts at Christmas time was one of our first decorating experiences. Little did you know then that creating your own holiday decorations is an ideal way of expressing your tastes. For example, if you have traditional tastes, work with red, green, silver and gold. But if you’re into retro, then create snowflakes in bright colors like cyan blue, neon green and hot pink. When you are the designer, the only limit is your imagination. The same goes for gift giving. When you design gifts, you do it with a specific person and their tastes in mind. Crafting gives us an opportunity to be unique and create one-of-a-kind art for decorating or giving.
Here are a few ideas that I have for you to bring the snowflake into your Holiday decorations by painting them on fabrics and much more!
We’ve just added eight snowflake designs in a unique downloadable book to The Stencil Store (see tab above). You can find the snowflakes in the Holidays Collection. Four of the designs are for snowflake cutouts and four are to make snowflake stencils. The book includes many projects for using these snowflake patterns including creating a 3-D Centerpiece, decorating napkins and some thrifty gift making ideas. Here are some craft projects that you can create with these patterns.
Set a unique and festive Holiday table this year by decorating cloth napkins. I found a great pack of colorful cotton napkins at a discount department store and painted a small snowflake in the corner using the snowflake stencils. When the napkin is folded or strung through a napkin ring, the snowflake is the centerpiece. Make sure to find a napkin that is made from a smooth fabric that does not have a texture to it. You can find fabric paints at your local crafts supply store. When applying paint to the napkin through the stencil use an up and down, dabbing motion to apply paint to the fabric. A back and forth motion with the brush will push paint under the stencil and smear your image. Use a brush made for stenciling. Foam brushes work well too. Keep the brush on the dry side. An overloaded brush can cause paint to seep under the stencil. Heavier color is achieved by applying several light layers of color with drying time in between.
Along with the keeping it simple theme, I tied my napkins with a thin rope chord and glued a couple of wooden Christmas trinkets to each end instead of using a fancy napkin ring.
I mentioned that you can find fabric paints at your local craft supply store, but if you can’t, regular acrylics work well too. However, they may not wash as well and tend to be a little stiffer when dry.
Good golly – let’s get jolly! Do you like to wear your Christmas spirit? Then paint some snowflakes on a t-shirt or sweatshirt. Maybe you know someone who likes to wear Christmas art. Then make a wearable gift for them. Paint several snowflakes across the front. Use a different color for each and then top it off with some spray glitter. There is so much you can do with simple snowflake crafts.
Have you seen those nice cloth or velvet wine bags at the discount stores? If you find some plain ones they are great for enhancing with stenciled snowflakes. Just secure your stencils in place and tap on a little paint. The one in the picture above is red and green velvet with a gold cord and tassel. So I painted my snowflake designs in gold paint and then used a light coat of gold spray glitter. Slide the bag over a nice bottle of wine and you have a fine gift for even the hardest to please.
Stencil a snowflake on the corner of a nice linen handkerchief. You can give it as the gift itself or wrap a treasure inside. I like to hang them over the side of a basket and fill the basket up with goodies like the one pictured above which is overflowing with red and green apples. I like to browse the flea markets and thrift stores to find vintage hankies. They lend an old world feel to your snowflake crafts.
Well, those are just a few of the ideas that you can find in the Snowflake Designs Book. From paper snowflakes to great gifts.
I hope you have a Very Merry Christmas and Happy Stenciling!
Penny