Christmas Light Upgrade For A Dollar Store Mirror

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Elves on every shelf! 

About a year or two ago, I purchased a pink plastic rotating two sided Dollar Store magnifying mirror, to take to a craft show. It broke shortly after. The mirrors fell off of the plastic. I held onto the mirrors, knowing they might work for a craft. Today they were given  new life, as a Christmas Light Mirror. 

Materials:

17 Replacement Bulbs or Old Bulbs

Hot glue

Double Sided Dollar Store Rotating Magnifying Mirror 

Dollar Store Gold Christmas Ornaments, Optional

Directions:

Lay one of your mirrors, usable side down, onto a plate. Place bulbs around mirror on plate. Shape bulbs into a circle. When you like the placement of the bulbs around the mirror, hot glue them down. I used lots of hot glue to secure bulbs to mirror. All the glue will be hidden, when you glue your other mirror down. Once bulbs are secure to the back side of one mirror, put lots more glue around the edge of your other mirror, then center it, and place down over bulbs.  Decorate with any ornaments you wish. I used scissors to cut the loop off of my "Joy"ornament, and hot glued it to the mirror and bulbs. Then I added a few glitter snowflakes. 

It's reversible too! It now sits in my china hutch, with some other homemade decorations, like our North Pole Christmas cookie jar, and mini wine bottle snowman.  

Well that's what I have been up to, what about you? Come share at our weekly Anything Goes linky party. 

Pumpkins And Garland Made From Place Mats And Our Halloween Mantel

Our mantel is always a challenge to decorate. It sits behind our wood stove, that is used often, living in the chili Sierra Mountains. I know what your thinking, whats the mailbox for, well it holds kindling and paper for the wood stove. I found it at a local thrift store. Speaking of thrift stores, I decorated our mantel with some thrifty pumpkins and garland, made with inexpensive place mats. 

There is still time to make these pumpkins and garland before Halloween, and they can be left up for Thanksgiving too. I found a set of 4 round orange place mats at Ross for less then a dollar each. I loved their country chic look, as they are made of stiffened twine. I decided to turn them into garland and pumpkins to hang around our home for Fall. Really any orange Dollar Store place mats will do. I purchased a dark burgundy place mat at the Dollar Store to cut up and use for stems. I also purchased plastic leaves from the Dollar Store to complete my pumpkin craft. 

Materials:

Orange Place Mats (I used 2 for garland, and 2 for larger Pumpkins)

1 brown, yellow, burgundy, or green place mat (for stems)

plastic leaves 12 -17 (depending on how many you want on each pumpkin)

Yarn (I used green, yellow, orange, and ivory)

Hot Glue

Directions:

For a single large pumpkin, take one large orange place mat, and hot glue a stem to it. I used burgundy, but really any contrasting color scrap of  place mat will do for a stem. I made decorative loops in yarn and hot glued them to the stem, to represent vines. You could also use coiled green floral wire. Then I hot glued some leaves over the yarn. 

For garland, I used the same technique as I did for the larger pumpkins but I made them small, by cutting circles out of two place mats. Once I had 8 small pumpkins made, I decided to make the center pumpkin on the garland a little larger then the rest. After all of your pumpkins are made, hot glue pumpkins to your long strands of yarn, I used yellow, orange, ivory, and green. Measure to make sure your garland will be the right length for the desired location in your home, and space pumpkins evenly apart. 

I hope you will make some place mat pumpkins and garland too!

My metal dress form that I usually use for craft shows, looks festive with a cape and pumpkin bucket head. 

Hope your Halloween is spooktackular!

Well that's what I have been up to, please share what you have been making at our weekly Anything Goes linky party.