Sharing the Joy: Weekend Crafting

I'm planning on making one or two of these this year.  They are so awesome and surprisingly easy!

Paperback Book Christmas Tree

Tear off the front and back covers of a paperback book, leaving the binding intact.

Take the top corner of a page and fold it down to meet the binding.

Then fold the same page down to meet the binding again.

Turn up the resulting triangle at the bottom of the page so that it is even with the bottom of the book.  Make the same three folds on the next page.

Repeat the folds on every page until the tree looks generously proportioned--about 150 pages.  To make things easier, clip folded pages together as you go.  Trim the excess pages off the binding by using a utility knife or box cutter to cut through the spine.

Glue first and last pages together so the tree fans around and stands on its own.

To decorate the trees, mist edges with silver spray paint and glue on metallic rickrack "garlands."  For topper, stick a toothpick through a rhinestone button shank and into book spine.  Or glue bits of glittered floral pick to top.  To make silver rosettes, wind small pieces of silver pipe cleaners into circles, gluing a pearl bead in the centers.  Glue rosettes onto the tree.

Note:  I purchased some thin silver ribbon with colorful glitter embedded inside the ribbon to use as garland instead of the rickrack.  Also, they say silver spray paint, but if you look at the image above, the can says glitter spray so I think that's what they meant.  If there are other colors of glitter spray available, like green, red, gold, or even blue, I think that would be nice as well.

This craft was in the December 2011 issue of Family Circle magazine and can also be found on their website.

Always in spirit....