Christmas Angel

Original Source: Jane Maddin, 1st Orleans Pathfinders, Orleans, Ontario, Canada

Ecru or white crochet cotton
A small ribbon rose
15 inches of Pearls on a string.
12 inches of narrow ribbon
a small round stiffened doily

(I used a 6 inch Battenburg lace doily, which I stiffened with fabric stiffener the day before and folded in half, and let dry overnight.)
And a lo-melt glue gun

Make a tassle for the body of the angel with the crochet cotton by wrapping the cotton around one hand. (How to make a tassle - One hundred and twenty five wraps made a nice tassle about 4 inches long, on my hand. Tie a piece of crochet cotton about 6 inches long through the loops [this will also be your hanger, so knot it at the top], fold the loops down and tie a second piece about 6 inches long, around the whole thing about one half an inch below the crochet cotton that you tied first. Cut through all the loops at the bottom of the tassle.)

With your fingers smooth out the strings of your tassle. Decide which will be the front and back. The half inch area at the top is her head! Take one and one half inches of beads off the 15 inches that you had to start - you will make her halo with this!
Fold the ribbon in half. Fold the long string of beads in half. Glue the ribbon and the beads together in the center and glue them on to her chest. Take a few strands from the right and left sides of the tassle to be arms. Cut them shorter so that they are the right length. You might want to tie a small piece of cotton around her 'wrists' but you don't really have to. Glue her hands onto the fold in the ribbon and beads - against her chest and then glue the ribbon flower onto of them.

Take the short piece of beads, shape it into a ring and glue it onto the back of her head to be the halo. Don't glue your hanger into the halo!! You may find it easier to glue one end down, wait for it to dry a bit (only a couple of seconds) and then twist the other end around and glue it down.
Glue the stiffened doily onto her back, again being careful not to catch the hanger in the glue.

The instructions look a little tricky, but really this is a very simple craft!

Pine Cone Christmas Tree centrepiece

Original Source: Ann, gsusa - Illinois crossroads council - Palatine

Trim the pine cone so it stands on end.
Spray with green spray paint and then while wet sprinkle with fine white glitter. Glue a small red skirt around the bottom of your tree (tree skirt) and place a few small wrapped boxes on the bottom.

Readers Digest Christmas Tree

Ok, as promised, some Christmas goodies ... let me know if you try any of these things out :-)


Readers Digest Christmas Tree
Original Source: Bonnie Sedore

Supplies:
•Readers Digest magazine
•Glue
•Glitter
•Spray paint( green, gold, or silver)

Directions:
Remove both covers from magazine.
Take the upper right hand corner of the first page & bring it down so that the top edge of the page rest against the glued binding of the magazine.
Now crease this first fold, carefully.
Again take this page &fold it over until the crease rests against the glued binding of the magazine.
Crease second fold.
Finally fold the triangle (that overlaps the bottom of the magazine) upward so it will be even with the bottom of the book, crease it.
The first page is finished continue folding & creasing the remaining pages.
When the magazine is completely folded glue the front & back pages together. Paint tree, add glitter while wet add star to top.

Mexican Camphat Blanket

AgeGroups: Pippins/Brownies/Guides


We had a Special Spark Day, with an international theme last January. One of the crafts the girls did was to make a Mexican camphat blanket. You know those woven Mexican serape type blankets that are available. Those really colourful ones with the fringes.

Well, here is our camphat rendition.

1. Cut out some pieces of felt, 3 inches, by 5 inches, any old color will do. Fray the ends by just snipping the long ends in about a half inch each.
2. Pre cut a huge batch of very bright colourful yarns to the exact length of your felt blanket strip, minus the frayed edge ends - probably 4 inches long would be good.

Give the girls each a felt 3 x 5 piece of felt with frayed ends. Give each girl a film canister of white glue and a Popsicle stick. Let her choose the colours of wool pieces she'd like to use (give them lots of choice and many bright solid colours)

Let them go wild with the gluing on of the yarn strips. Have them glue the strips very tightly together along the length of the blanket.

Some girls just make a hodge podge of colour, others choose to have coordinated colour coded patterns. Whatever they choose, they are all beautiful when the glue dries.

Supply with a gold pin to pin it to their hats.