Now For Something Altered

On Monday, I attended an altered item workshop arranged here in my condo complex by a friend. The instructor was the Artsy Fartsy Fairy, aka Shirley Seay.

As you can see, we turned a wooden bird house from Michaels into a wonderful illuminated Christmas decoration.

We used decoupage to apply DP to the bird house. Shirley allowed us to choose from her extensive stash of papers which means two things; first, every one had a unique house, and second, I have no idea whose papers I used. Sorry about that. I love the papers I picked out, and I wish I did know whose they are so that I could get more.

This little guy is too darned cute.

This, for me, was the most time consuming part of the day. Once I had all the paper adhered and a second coat of Mod Podge applied and dried, I chose from Shirley's huge selection of embellishments. I decided to go for the 'less is more policy'. I kept it down to a snowman, and tree, a dove, a star, and a bit of gold rick rack for the roof lines, all of which I attached using tacky glue and super glue. We all put some feet on the bottom of the house. (The main reason for the feet is to allow clearance for the cord from the light.)

Finally, I applied a clear-drying glue to the roof and a couple of other surfaces, and sprinkled mica flakes over everything. Shirley's husband had pre drilled a hole in the bottom of each house, and she supplied us with a light kit that we could put into the bottom to light up the inside. I just love the results.

All lit up and glowing.

I know that Shirley took lots of pictures so if you want to see all the finished houses, check out her blog as linked above.

Now the only thing remaining is to figure out how to take this all the way back to Alberta in one piece. Even though we are driving back, this will still be pretty tricky. Wish me luck.