The growing season is about over for the summer and I’ve planted my winter garden already (just a little early because it’s been so cool) Normally- planting a winter garden should be done after Labor Day. I’ve planted carrots, radishes, onion, lettuce, broccoli and beets. I will show you a really cool way to plant potatoes in February.
So, I’ve decided to dedicate the next few months to gifts that you can make at home to give for Christmas. I know that there are many people struggling. I can feel the anxiety out there. People are unemployed or underemployed and hurting. With Christmas coming up I thought I’d try to help out by showing you how to make inexpensive gifts. The only thing is - you’ll have to start now. If you start now, you can make all the gifts you’ll need with plenty of time to appreciate the wonderful gifts that God has given you.
The first set of gifts will be for kids. I’m going to take a stack of glass plates I bought from the dollar store and paint cartoon characters on them. I’m doing this first one of Lightning McQueen from Disney’s Cars.
If you are not the artistic type you can take a coloring page out of a book or off the computer and tape it to the front of the plate.
You don’t want any paint where it will meet food so we’ll be painting on the back of the plate. Remember to be careful with words or numbers because if you don’t reverse them they will appear backward on the front of the plate when you are finished.
I like to use a black Deco Paint pen to start. Just outline the image with your pen and make sure you have plenty of ventilation in the room. Now I’ll start using acrylic enamel plant using small brushes. You can go from one color to the next just by washing the brush off with a little water and drying it with paper towels. I’ve always used Apple Barrel colors. In fact, I’ll be using Apple Barrel colors for this whole series of painted glass projects.
Now just fill in the color. Don’t worry if it’s not perfect. It will look great! Remember, you can always fix little imperfections with an Xacto blade or (if the paint is still wet) a Q-tip. Don’t worry if it isn’t perfect. You aren’t a machine and you are creating with love. It will look great. If you really don’t like it you can wash it off and start over.
Next you’ll take a natural sponge (you can get one at the craft store) and wet it so it’s soft. Now squeeze all the water out of it. You can blot it on a paper towel to get any excess water out of it if you need to. Choose a background color. This will also fill in all those pin prick holes you may see in the glass when you look through it.
Put a little paint on a paper plate. Dab the sponge into the paint and test it out on the plate. When you think you’ve got the hang of it, start sponging your plate.
Look through the plate to make sure you don’t have any big blobs of color anywhere and when you are happy with the results, step away and let it dry.
It’s now time to bake your creation. Put your plate color side up in a cold oven. Set the timer to one hour and turn the oven on to 325 degrees. When the preheat light turns off - start your timer. You’ll want to bake your glass for one hour. Turn the oven off after an hour and DON’T OPEN THE OVEN. You don’t want to open the oven until it’s completely cool. I usually do this an hour before I go to bed so I can leave it overnight.
I hear you can put these plates into the dishwasher after they are baked but I wouldn’t risk your creation to that. Be safe and hand wash them.
Once you’ve washed the finger prints off your plates you are ready. I found some dry erase boards at Target for $1 and a set of dry erase markers (10 for $5) and that will complete the gift. A few markers at 50 cents each with a dry erase board as a place mat and you have a complete gift. $1 plate - $1 placemat and $1.50 markers plus Apple Barrel paints (about $1.49 each) that you can use for the next two projects. Not bad at all.
Stay tuned for our next Christmas project.
"Jesus kept his wounds so that we would experience his mercy. This is our strength and our hope". Pope Francis
No comments:
Post a Comment