Posts Tagged ‘christmas’

One of the latest additions to Kaisercraft’s Beyond-the-Page product line is their fabulous 25 Drawer Treasure Chest. It makes a really useful storage unit but I decided to decorate one to create a beautifully extravagant Advent Calendar.

I painted all the MDF parts of the 25 Drawer Treasure Chest with Kaisercolor Acrylic White paint before assembling them. I decided to give it a slightly whitewashed look by applying thin coats of paint (although, due to the large size of the chest, it still needed two tubes of paint). I assembled the MDF and glued it with EvoStik Wood Glue and then covered the sides and top with pieces of Bazzill White cardstock (which covers the visible parts of the joints) and decorated with Silly Season Rub-ons.

The drawers are made in a similar way to the smaller drawers of the Kaisercraft BTP Advent Calendar (see step 12 in our previous post for details) but I used the Silly Season papers and covered the drawer fronts in squares from the Milk & Cookies and Gingerbread papers. I then finished the edges of the drawers with a White Paint Dabber and a few rhinestones. The chipboard numbers are supplied with the Treasure Chest – I painted them with the Paint Dabber and applied Crystal Lacquer.

On top of the chest I created a Reindeer and Sleigh scene using some of Kaisercraft’s latest Wood Flourish designs. I filled the Sleigh will presents cut from the Presents Foil paper and decorated the Reindeer with a Flourish Background Stamp and some Hot Pink Rhinestones and used an old necklace as reins.

I hope you like my large size Silly Season themed Advent  Calendar – it was great fun to make is a nice contrast to the vintage looking Advent Calendar in my earlier post.

In part 1 of this post we outlined how we painted and assembled the Kaisercraft Advent Calendar. In this post we describe how we decorated the Advent Calendar with the recently released December 25th collection from Kaisercraft.

You can, of course, use a wide range of different papers to decorate your Kaisercraft Advent Calendar but I wanted to give it a vintage feel to match the photo I planned to use at it’s centre. As described in the previous post, I had already covered the drawers with papers from Kaisercraft’s December 25th Collection and painted the whole calendar in Kaisercolor Raw Umber paint. This post continues from that point.

1. I started by applying a little gold paint around the front edges of the drawers using a Ranger Acrylic Paint Dabber. This gives them a slightly distressed, vintage effect and adds a little sparkle at the same time. I printed out the numbers 1 to 24 on a colour printer and glued them to the front of the drawers before applying some Crystal Lacquer to give them shine. 
2. I decorated the outside edges of the calendar with strips cut from the reverse of the Wish paper (P719) from the December 25th collection. The calendar is just slightly longer than the paper so small corner pieces are needed to fill the gaps. I also cut some “wrought iron” corners from Pinecone Bazzill Cardstock using the Cricut Expression and the “Ornamental Iron 2″ cartridge to further decorate the corners. Then I used the Gold Paint Dabber again to add some sparkle to all the front edges of the calendar.
3. I decided to decorate the centre of the Advent Calendar with a Christmas photograph from the past. I started by cutting a piece of the Noel paper (P718) slightly smaller than the central area, distressing the edges and colouring them with the Paint Dabber. I mounted it in the centre of the calendar and layered on a square of the reverse of the Wish paper and then the photo (printed in sepia tone). The date plaque is a Kaisercraft Square Bookplate Wood Flourish (FL332) coloured with a Brown Ink Pad and distressed with the Gold Paint Dabber. The date itself is printed on a colour printer onto a scrap of the Wish paper.
4. The present decoration in front of the photo is a ScrapFX Present Corner Chipboard Shape (2009278C). The presents have been decorated with scraps of paper, coloured with Ink Pads and embellished with coordinating December 25th Jewels. The ribbon scroll is coloured with a Lipstick Ink Pad and then Red KindyGlitz Glitter Glue. The Chipboard Shape is glued to the corner of the calendar using Crystal Lacquer as a glue.

I hope you like the end result and it inspires you to create your own unique version of the Advent Calendar. Oh, and in case you are wondering, the little girl with the brand new doll on her lap in the middle of the photo is indeed me. Every time I look at the photo it makes me smile – and I think that’s what any Christmas decoration should be all about !

Chrissy xx

We’ve had a few requests from customers to provide instructions on the best way to make the Kaisercraft Advent Calendar so we’ve painted and assembled one and written this (rather long) post – hopefully you will find it of use.

Actually, this is the first of two posts on this subject – this one describes how we have assembled the main part of the Calendar and drawers. The next post describes how we decorated it.

There are probably other ways to assemble the Advent Calendar but what we’ve written below certainly works for us. If you have any further suggestions please feel free to get in touch.

1. Once unpacked the Kaisercraft Advent Calendar will contain one sheet of chipboard numbers, 25 chipboard drawers (24 for the calendar and one spare), a large MDF base (or back) board and a number of other MDF parts as shown in the picture below. The two parts marked A below are joined by tabs and are 32.6cm long – just a few millimetres longer than the four parts marked B which are 32cm long. There are two shorter parts marked C and 20 parts marked E (joined into two sheets of 10).
2. We would recommend that the parts are painted before they are separated since they are much easier to hold that way. If you are using Kaisercolor Acrylic Paint then, for dark colours, you will probably need to apply only two coats while lighter colours such as white may need three coats. You should not paint the tabs since they will then be more difficult to insert into their respective slots. The part marked D on the picture only needs its edges painted while all other parts should be painted on both sides (although, as mentioned, tabs should be avoided). The picture below shows the same parts after painting.
3. The backboard is also best painted at this stage. You should paint all around the edges but you do not need to paint the back or the centre if you intend to cover it with paper. Try to avoid getting paint inside the slots in the board since it will make assembly more difficult.
4. The best way we have found to separate the tabbed parts is using the Tim Holtz scissors but you can also use a strong, sharp craft knife (in which case it’s best to make a V-shaped cut from one side and gently separate the pieces). Tidy up the cut edges, especially on either side of each of the small pieces (marked E on the image), using a sharp knife or a file.
5. We’ve found that the tabs can sometimes be very tight to assemble – they are tight fit to start with and, unfortunately, the paint can cause the MDF to swell slightly making them even tighter. We would recommend using a sharp knife or file along each side of each tab to make them into a wedge shape (as shown in the picture below) – this makes them much easier to put together.
6. The next image shows the painted back board and indicates where each tabbed piece goes on the board. Place the back board flat on a strong desk or table and insert the tabbed parts carefully before pushing them home firmly. You may need to place a piece of scrap wood (or something like a strong coaster) on the top edge of the parts to push them home (but make sure you don’t push them over sideways and break the tabs). We would recommend assembling parts C (marked in yellow) first, followed by parts B (marked in green) and then parts A (marked in red).
7. The small tabbed parts (E) should be inserted after A, B and C. Again, place the back board on a firm surface and push the parts in firmly using a scrap piece of wood if necessary, making sure that they are all aligned vertically and the individual gaps for the drawers are all the same size.
8. If the tabs were particularly tight to assemble then glue may not be necessary. However, we would recommend that you apply a little wood glue or PVA glue to the back of each of the tabs to fix them permanently (and to the corners of the Calendar if necessary). We use Evo-Stik Wood Adhesive (available from Homebase) for this because it is very strong, dries clear and is extra fast acting to save time.
9. Because the back board is slightly larger than the main body of the Calendar, it may cause it to lean forward slightly. The part labeled D in the first picture can be glued to the front-bottom edge of the Calendar to correct this lean if required.
10. After gluing it may be necessary to touch-up some areas of paint (for example around the outside edges) – now is the time to do this. Once the main part of your Calendar is completed it should look something like the image below :
11. There are probably many ways to make the drawers for the Advent Calendar but the best way we have found is by sticking each corner of each drawer together with short strips of double-sided tape. The same tape can then be used later to stick the paper onto the drawers.
12. To cover each drawer you should cut a strip of paper the same height as the drawer and long enough to wrap around three sides plus a few millimetres at each side of the front. Squares to fit the front of each drawer can be cut from the specially designed Kaisercraft 12×12 papers (e.g. the Believe paper from the December 25th collection or the Milk & Cookies paper from the Silly Season collection) or from other papers of a suitable colour. To cut the finger hole into the square, turn it over and use the drawer as a template to mark the shape of the finger hole before cutting it out with a small pair of scissors (curved nail scissors work especially well).
13. The cover each drawer, remove the backing from the double-sided tape on the drawer, optionally use a glue stick to dab a little extra adhesive onto the chipboard and then wrap the paper around the drawer before sticking the square on the front. The next image shows each stage of this process.

At this stage you should have a fully assembled Calendar and 24 fully assembled drawers. From this point onwards there are many ways to decorate your Advent Calendar to make it unique. In the next post we’ll describe how we decorated ours.

As part of the preparations for Christmas I decided to make some table decorations to match my colour scheme of black, white and silver. The Medium and Small Flourish trees were perfect for what I had in mind.

The medium tree is an ideal size for the centre of the table and the small flourish trees are ideal for the name placements I want to make.

First I painted both trees with white Kaisercolour paint and, once they were dry, stamped all the pieces using the Script Background Stamp and a black ink pad. I then painted each of the bird and flower shapes with black Kaisercolour paint and covered the same areas with Crystal Laquer. I added Pearls, Kindyglitz Glitter Glue, bows and, on each corner,  black hanging beads (that were made using black Kaisercraft Pearls stuck together with a piece of cotton through the middle).

The Small Flourish Tree was finished in a similar way – I just added the name to make a perfect name placement.

Here is a list of the products used for this project:

• FL313 Medium Flourish Tree
• FL312 Small Flourish Tree
• KC001 Kaisercolour Paint – White
• KC031 Kaisercolour Paint – Black
• CS752 Clear Stamp – Script Background
• IP707 Ink Pad – Black
• SB713 Pearls – Pearl
• SB793 Pearls – Black
• EM926 White Lace Ribbon (for the Bows)
• CS760 Clear Stamps – Tags
• EM923 White Tag Pack
• KG-021828 Kindyglitz Crystallina
• CL-01802 Crystal Laquer Pack

Our Christmas preparations continue with a Hanging Tree decoration styled with Kaisercraft papers.

My daughter Merley (aged 12) created this fabulous Scallop Hanging Tree decorated with papers from the Kaisercraft Home for Christmas collection. All the presents, birds, words and even the Christmas pudding were cut out from the papers. Merley has also added some Kaisercraft Pearls and highlighted some parts with Crystal Lacquer.

The separate parts of the tree were joined with some matching ribbon offcuts and the presents were hung from the bottom with thread.

Here is a list of the products used on this project:

• SB2079 Scallop Hanging Tree
• P296 Egg Nog paper (Home for Christmas collection)
• P297 Kris Kringle (Home for Christmas collection)
• P298 Santa’s Delivery (Home for Christmas collection)
• P299 Sleigh Ride (Home for Christmas collection)
• SB786 Pearls – Rose
• SB784 Pearls – Ice Green
• CL-01802 Crystal Lacquer Set
• Ribbon offcuts

I know it’s a bit early but I’ve decided to get into the spirit of Christmas, so my first Christmassy project this year just had to be the Holly Wreath made with some of the papers from the Be Merry Collection.

After separating and lightly sanding down all the pieces of the Kaisercraft Holly Wreath (SB2078) I arranged all the Holly leaves on the circle frame and, once I was happy with the layout of them, I then thought about which papers to use on the leaves. I decided that I wanted to use more than one colour of paper on the wreath and that I definitely wanted to incorporate the very cute reindeer from the fabulous Chirpy paper.

I used the back of the Chirpy paper (P559) to cover the largest of the three pronged leaves and then used a brown ink pad (IP708) to stamp with the Script Background stamp (CS752) over them. On the smaller three pronged leaves I used the Cheer paper (P558) and on the large long leaves with the berries I used the green side of the Happy paper (P560). I finished the edges of the all of the leaves using a brown ink pad. I then cut out some berries, approximately 25mm across, from a scrap of red card and used Crystal Lacquer on them. I also cut out two large Reindeer, two smaller reindeer and one Christmas Tree from the Chirpy paper, finished them all with a coat of Crystal Lacquer and then added some red Rhinestones (SB711) for a little sparkle.

The next bit may seem a little obsessive but its a great way of making sure you are happy with the final effect. Once all the pieces were decorated I rearranged them back onto the wooden inner circle and took a photo of the finished wreath. I then took a couple more photos removing a few pieces each time. I then used the pictures I had taken to reassemble the wreath, gluing each piece with PVA adhesive. Once all the leaves were glued down I used foam pads to attach the Reindeer and the Christmas Tree.

The finished wreath is a modern looking take on the traditional Holly Wreath. For a slightly different look, here is the Kaisercraft Star Wreath (SB2064) I made last year using the papers of the Belle Collection.