'Crystal' Ornament Hangers–Ballard Style

photo from Ballard

I love to spend time each evening browsing for different Christmas ideas. Last night, these cute Holiday Magnetic Crystals on the Ballard site caught my eye. So pretty! But I couldn’t pay $39 for them. That’s just not in our budget.
So I dug out some some old shatterproof ornaments that I bought when my kids were in their Christmas tree destroying phase (not entirely sure that we’ve bypassed that stage yet!), along with some plastic beads, a magnet, spray paint, and the hot glue gun.

A straw and an egg carton from the recycle bin served as a holder for spray painting – look, action shot from the garage. I let the paint dry overnight, and then used my glue gun to attach beads to the top of the ornament. I like the delicate beads in the Ballard ornament, but I had star shaped beads and only a few round ones, so that’s what I used.

I tried using pliers to break a magnet into smaller pieces so that they would fit invisibly on top of the beads, but the magnet shattered. Plan B was a glue dot from my scrapbooking supplies, which worked perfectly.

Here’s the finished ornament. I really love the beads instead of string or ribbon, and can’t wait to make more. Here’s another view:

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Sew Dang Cute -- CWTS Knockoffs

A Mirror for the Mantel

Our fireplace has never been much of a focal point. A couple years ago, my husband busted the glass (ironically, while trying to child proof it), so it’s been covered over and non functioning since then. The mantel has been used more for keeping things out of reach of the kids than for display. But a few days ago, I got a bee in my bonnet to put a mirror on the mantel, which I hoped would reflect more light into the room and generally make it less junky looking.

So I hit the local online classifieds, looking for a great deal. Nothing. After a couple days, I came across this mirror listed at $25. Not a great deal, but not awful for a good-sized piece (37”x31.5”). It was practically across the city, meaning a long drive in rush hour, but I got it for $20, so I was willing to go for it – dust, spider webs, weird gold accent trim and all.

After cleaning the mirror and frame, I taped everything off, excitedly grabbed a can of Oil Rubbed Bronze and was ready to transform this piece from dated to awesome. Hubby nixed the idea, as it was too cold to paint outside or in the garage, and he said the fumes in the house would be smelly all night long.

So, the next day, when the temperature finally climbed to 10C, I hauled the mirror out to the garage and gave it several coats of spray. I figured I was safe to skip primer, since this won’t be getting a lot of handling.

Tada! No more gold! Now I just need to come up with some decent autumn decorations to help my little scarecrows along.

Oh, I forgot to take a photo, but I took a length of ribbon and added snaps to either end of it and wrapped it around the hanging wire on the back of the mirror. It’s tucked behind there now, but when I want to hang a wreath, I can just pull the ribbon over the top of the mirror to the front, and snap it around the wreath. Little things make me happy!

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