Recently my wonderful in-laws celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary, and while that is absolutely amazing and wonderful and celebration-worthy, what might be even more amazing is that I got quite a few family members to sit down around a table together to help me craft some of the decorations. Not that the family doesn’t get along…they just aren’t particularly crafty.
But this craft was so easy and simple that we all were able to do it without any whining or complaining or mistakes. Actually that’s not true. There was whining and complaining and mistakes. And there were also some non-participants. But we had fun and accomplished a really classy, meaningful craft that was a real show-stopper at their party.
Behold…
Nice, huh? (We also made the puff balls, but that’s another post for another time…)
I think these would lend themselves well for birthdays or graduations or weddings or just favorite photos to sit around the house. You can’t tell from the picture really, but they look so pretty with the soft light of the candle shining through.
Here’s what you need and how you put one together…
- Clear vellum (We were making many of these, so I bought a pack of 25 for about $7, but you can buy by the sheet in most craft stores)
- ModPodge
- a foam tipped paint brush
- a clear, cylindrical vase (I got this one at the Dollar Tree. It was about 7″ high. They also had some at Wal-Mart that I think would work that are about 8-9″ high. Your photo would not cover the entire piece though. It would go around it, but some glass would be uncovered on the top and bottom. They were about $3 each.)
- a paper trimmer
- an 8×11″ photo (can be either black and white or color; I really like how the muted colors of these vintage photos worked out for this project.)
- I have an adhesive runner pictured, but I didn’t actually end up using it. In some cases you could put a little adhesive on the corners of the photo to get it positioned correctly before aggressively adhering it to the glass.
Okay, first of all, make a copy of the photo onto one sheet of vellum using your printer. I didn’t have to change any settings on mine, but vellum is a different weight than your standard printer paper, so try one before loading multiple pages, just in case your printer is sensitive to that.
Once you made the copy, try wrapping the vellum around the vase to see how it fits. I had to trim about an inch off horizontally. Vertically, it just overlapped about half an inch, so I didn’t trim that way.
Set the vellum aside. Pour a little bit of the ModPodge onto a plastic plate and dip the end of your brush into it. Spread on evenly using long strokes. A little goes a long way, so be careful here. You don’t want drips.
You’ll want it to look like the above photo: evenly covered, but still able to see through it.
Once the ModPodge is on the vase, grab your vellum photo and line it up. Start in the middle and start sticking it down and smoothing it out. We just used our hands and were able to get most of the bubbles out. The ModPodge is forgiving, so if you need to pull it up and start again, you can. If you have to do this more than once, you may need to apply another coat of ModPodge.
And that’s it! Allow to dry completely, and then place your votive candle or tea light inside and light. They made awesome centerpieces, and it was rewarding to see so many guests admiring the various photos we used.
Enjoy!
