Christmas! ... In January?

Confession- I’m a little behind in finishing some of my Christmas presents. :/  I’m sure you’ve NEVER heard of someone not able to finish all the projects they set out to make, right? ;) With a house move and my brother being hospitalized many times this fall, I had to let some things slip.

Lucky for me, I wasn’t seeing this friend until January AND her birthday is in January, which was perfect motivation to complete this hand crafted present. 

My friend Rebecca is a super talented jewelry maker and all around awesome gal that also advises a group of sorority women with me.  Both of us appreciate and enjoy crafting in all sorts of ways, and have even been vendors at craft shows together.  Her company name is “The Beading Bird” and much of the display items for her jewelry involve birds.

I found two charming decorative birdhouses at a local thrift shop and decided these were destined for Rebecca!  Her colors are a lovely coral and soft aqua, which I used to paint the houses first.  Craft paint and two paint brushes (a craft foam brush and a smaller brush for details) helped with painting the two colors.  After a few coats of paint and drying time, I finished birdhouses with a coat of varnish.  Here is what they looked like after painting.

Next, I wanted to add some excitement and texture to these birdhouses, and the idea of shingles came to mind.  I measured the width of the birdhouse roof and cut a strip of Very Vanilla paper to that size.  I then ran the strip of paper through my scallop edge punch.  After scalloping the edge, I trimmed the paper to ¼ inch to give me a row of scalloped "shingles." I repeated the process for each surface I wanted to shingle, which meant several rows of the scalloped shingles per side of the roof.

After cutting my paper, I added color by running the edges over the Pool Party ink pad.  This brought out the color of the aqua roof on the birdhouses and added some texture to the look of the paper.  Finally, I coated the inked side of the paper with some Crystal Effects to give the shingles a shiny, lacquered finish.

These paper strips dried overnight, and then were ready for attachment the next day.  I used a glue gun to adhere these to the roof of the birdhouse.  While other adhesives like Tombo glue will work, I found that the drying time of hot glue really helped to expedite this process for me. 

To adhere the rows of shingles, I ran a strip of hot glue along the surface of the roof about a quarter inch from the bottom and adhered the strip of paper to the hot glue, trying not to press down too hard.  This helped me to obtain the raised look of the shingles so they weren’t completely flat against the surface of the roof.  I repeated this process until all roof surfaces were tiled.  Trim any bits that might overhang the edge of the roof.

Now my friend can use these adorable birdhouses in her jewelry display or as decoration in her home!