Love the Jute Christmas Trees

My heart is singing!  That's what happens when I am in Christmas crafting mode! Today I have been making some ornaments for the Christmas tree our church is decorating for a Christmas party we are helping to sponsor for children with Downs.  We are really excited to be involved in this ministry.  

Supplies:

I have some styrofoam trees (approx 2"X4"),  jute twine, glue gun and glue.  The trees and jute are from Hobby Lobby.  

Then I grabbed a garland of snowflakes.  These are made to hang your Christmas cards on, I think.  They are from the Dollar Tree.  It is tiny clothes pins with felt snowflakes on a piece of jute.  I just cut off the jute and I will show you how I used them in a minute.... This is optional - kind of a last minute idea I had!!!  


Something to keep in mind - the hot glue will melt the styrofoam so you have to use little dollups.  You start at the top of the tree, curl the end of your jute and glue to top.  Then as you go around and around the tree, you put a little line, about 1/4 inch or less, and keep wrapping around pulling it up snug to the previous circle of jute.  I hope I can explain it - at the point here in this picture - I put a line up and down of glue. Like I said, about 1/4", and wrap around and around until I have gone past the glue then I make another line and continue winding jute around.  When I get down to the wider part of the cone I will do two or three lines of glue about  an inch apart. And remember to wrap it snug and to pull up to keep jute tight so the cone does not show.  Continue all the way to the edge, then continue on the bottom.  IF you prefer, you can stop at the edge and glue a piece of felt to the bottom. 

Once you have the cone completely covered you can use it just as it is as a part of any of your decor.  A cluster of trees on the mantle would look pretty.

This is what the bottom of the jute covered cone looks like.
You can see little bits of dried glue, but I will cut or pull them off.  Or even use the tip of my hot glue gun to melt them into the jute.

 I cut a piece of jute and tied a tight knot.  Then I glued it to the top of the tree so I could hang it on the tree.  Put a small dot of glue on the knot then use something like the tip of your scissors to apply pressure as you put it on the top of the tree.

 Next I glued the tiny clothes pins with the snowflake on the trees.  I did it this way because I am stamping little messages on a piece of cardstock to pin.  You could just pin it to the top for a tree topper if you prefer.

Are these not just adorable??!!  I really like the way they turned out.  They can be used on the tree as ornaments.  I stamped "joy" and "merry" to put into the clothes pin.  You could use it on a package and put the recipients name in the pin.  How cute!  If you wanted to add some ribbon to the top, you could.  Some buffalo plaid would be really cute.  I just really like the simple look here, so I'm not going to add ribbon this time.  

These trees would look so good on a table setting to hold place cards!

Please let me know how you like these and if you make them, show me a picture!!!!