In the Palm of My Hand!

Good Morning Everyone!  Before I get started, I need to get the business out of the way first to my sister Sandy - Sands, if you don't want to see any of the decorations for your party next week, don't read any further!! 

We are entering into a big week in my family.  First, my baby sister, Laura, will be honored as Detective of the Year for the DC police department.  I am so proud of her!  Additionally, I will be hosting my older sister's 50th birthday party at my home.  I am so excited to not only be able to celebrate this milestone with her, but also to decorate for a themed tropical/cruise party!  As a gift to herself, Sandy will be taking a cruise with her wonderful friend Lori, which is where the theme came about.  Everyone has been asked to dress tropical or cruise-y - which will be very interesting since it is still March in Virginia and I'm not sure how we'll do in flip flops and sarongs in this cold!

I have started some of the decorations to give my home a tropical flavor..this week it was the palm trees and some flowers.

First, the front entry columns.  I figured out how to make palm fronds with foil tissue paper and a wire hanger.  I found the foil tissue at Michael's in the gift wrap section with the regular tissue paper.  For the trunks of the trees, I just used brown grocery bags.  I ripped the top of the bag for a jagged edge, then rubbed dark stencil gel along the top edge to give it a darker line.  Total cost per tree, about $2.99 for the foil.  What an impact!



Here is the view from my front door.  I will add some signs on the trees before the party, probably an arrow to the beach and one to the ship.  By the way, there is an "H" at the beginning of the banner hidden by the palm leaf..

Here is how to make the palm fronds.

There are 5 pieces of foil in each pack.  Lay them out on your work surface.

I opened up a wire hanger for each of them, keeping the hook part and trimming the opposite end to make it just shorter than the foil. Run some glue on either side of the hanger wire as well as on the wire itself



Fold the foil in half, making sure you press down along the wire, ensuring the glue makes contact with both sides.




Once the glue dries, trim all four corners of the foil, then make small cuts at an angle toward the hanger hook from the edge of the foil to about an inch from the center wire.  You can start seeing the fronds now.  Don't be perfect with the cutting, the choppier, the more natural they will look!





To attach the fronds to the columns, I used duct tape.  For each column, I measured out four pieces of tape the diameter of the column plus a few inches to overlap.  I then attached two of the pieces together on one side to make it double the width.  Lastly, I laid the final two pieces over the first two, sticky sides together.   I don't want to tape the duct tape to my columns directly as the glue in the tape can sometimes leave a residue.  I wrapped each piece at the top of my columns, then used another piece of duct tape to tape the ends together. 



I simply taped each hook end of the palm fronds to the duct tape base I created.  Once they were all up, I wrapped one more piece of tape around the entire column for added strength, then bent the ends of the palm fronds to give it a natural curve.



Once the fronds were in place, I just wrapped the columns, starting from the top, in the grocery bags, overlapping each as I moved down toward the floor.  I used a piece of duct tape, wrapped in a circle to make it two sided to hold each bag in place.  Once the tree was done, I ran a bead of glue along the edge to make it lay flat. 

On to the palms trees that I will place in my family room!

My neighbor gave me a few years ago.  Coffee cans mounted on a square base, filled with concrete with a metal pole sticking out of the top. I cannot tell you have many times I've used these!  Wrapped in balloons, holding up banners, plastic tubing filled with white twinkle lights!  These have a dozen uses!  Now they are the base for two more trees.



Terrible photo, I know, but I purchased some pvc pipe to go over the poles (about $4 each) and wrapped each pole in twinkle lights.  Next (and this is the part my son walked in on and thought I was nuts), I cut off the feet and top of three pairs of panty hose and pulled the leg portion over the pipe.  I cut a little hole at each little light and pulled the bulb through the panty hose.



After tucking in more palm fronds in the top of the pvc pipe, I placed them in the dark corner of my family room, which will be the dance floor for the party. 

The bases will be wrapped in greenery with flowers added - I won't do that until just before the party.  It makes a very pretty decoration!

Now to decorate the fireplace mantle.  I found this blog, http://mousechirpy-polkadotpineapple.blogspot.com/2010/01/wire-edged-fabric-flowers.html that explains how to make wire edged flowers.  Great instructions and easy to follow.  I used some of my scrap material and made the flowers to put on the mantle, along with some white flowers I already had (I keep everything!).

Some more twinkle lights and purple tulle (tulle is that fabric that looks sort of like the netting you would use for a ballerina tutu), then I lined the mantle with the flowers and felt leaves.  It looks very tropical!

The leaves I cut out of green felt.

Gathered the edge, then used the ends of the 18 gauge wires that I cut off from the flowers I made to hold the end in place.

Next week, I will show you more of the projects I'm doing for the party.  I have some fun things planned that I hope will make this my sister's best birthday ever!  Have a great week!