This little rose tree is unfinished as you can see but I wanted to show it to you as a work in progress so you could see what I’m making it on. I found a stash of old pressed cardboard cones in my crafting supplies and have been using them to create my little forest of trees for my mantle but I’m starting to run low. The prices on styrofoam ones are unreal and I much prefer to recycle and use up things around the house first anyway so I began with a coffee cup for the base. Now, a coffee cup forms the bottom part of the cone just beautifully but of course, it doesn’t go up into the point that I need at the top. So, to solve that problem I took a piece of scrap cardboard and made a cone “topper” that I hot glued onto the cup. Problem solved!
I’m covering the tree in little roses. They’re made using a ribbon rose technique I saw demonstrated on Cool2Craft by Tiffany Windsor. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3klKZ6LNGc]
Now I adapted her technique just a little bit. She’s rolling and then folding to the back – which makes kind of an open rose but I rolled and then folded towards myself thereby creating more of a rosebud. Either method will work though! I’ve seen Tiffany’s method before with ribbon and she’s demonstrating it in the Youtube video with strips of t-shirt fabric (which I LOVE!) but here I’m using tissue paper. I have this cream coloured tissue paper that’s kind of iridescent and have been saving it for a long time trying to find just the right use for it. I think it’s making such a lovely tree and when it’s complete, I’ll probably add another little bit of shimmer to it with some marshmallow Glimmer Mist. I’ll post pictures of the tree when it’s finished.
Oh, also, a little hint – I started out using a good white glue with these roses but after a few tries, I found that while the white glue worked well for little dabs to secure the rose as I went along, it didn’t hold very well when attaching the roses to the base. Of course, maybe I was just too impatient to sit there and hold it for the amount of time I needed – I do try to rush these things sometimes. I get excited about the way something’s turning out and I just want to see the completed project! In any case, I found that my trusty glue gun worked far better when it came to attaching the roses to the cone. Conversely, I did try using the glue gun for the whole process and found that it did NOT work well in securing the roses as I assembled them. It seemed to actually create a big mess and the pull of the glue was so strong it kind of pulled them apart. So, this definitely became a “two glue” process!
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