Christmas in July

Baby it's cold outside, not hardly! 

In good ole Mississippi we've been ranking 

in 85-100° weather. Like today is 85° only because 

it's cloudy. Yesterday was 88° with humidity at 90%.

I am bringing you a goodie for some 

Summer cheer what a treat for this time of year, 

right, Christmas in July. 

Above you will see I have my matte Mod Podge out along with my 

folk art vintage white acrylic paint. I covered a 

10x10 gallery wrap canvas with paper scrapes 

using the Mod Podge coming in behind 

with the vintage white paint. I smeared it all along 

the edges of the canvas touching the edges 

of the papers as well as lightly brushing

over the papers themselves. 

I used a piece of burlap painted a goldish brown color 

for the trunk of the tree created. Using book pages 

I rolled them and Mod Podge them in what looked to be 

the perfect place to start the base of the tree. 

Using an old piece of cardboard I penciled a 

star shape on the back and cut it out with scissors 

from my art table. Mod Podge was then placed 

on the back while I positioned it with the 

ridges of the cardboard facing foreword. 

This can be seen in picture below.

Once the Mod Podge dried I knew ornaments would be place
throughout the tree. During the drying process, 

I gathered the papers I'd use to cut 

small circles to use as the ornaments.

When I picked the paper I went 

with my best judgement of how I wanted the tree to feel and look, not 

every ones will look like mine, nor the persons next to you. I believe

this is very critical to remember when creating anything whether it 

be a meal, a wreath, a living room setting, an outfit etc. Be confident

in your work, your art regards what your working on. It's taking 

me years to come to those terms, but mine doesn't look like 

theirs. It's not intended to. It's what makes it yours. 

And that's very special…

After Mod Podging the ornaments in place, 

 see them above, I used bubble wrap. 

I love me some bubble wrap. 

Maybe I should bubble wrap a room… 

I used Americans cherry red on the edges 

of the canvas. 

I even smeared some on the front edges, see further below, 

with my finger where I continued using a blue and 

a dark brown going for a vintage look. 

I worked on this process 

until the picture felt complete. The more you create the more you 

will learn what that feeling feels like. I've even passed that feeling

before while creating and had to wait awhile longer until I reached

another moment in my creating process 

for it to feel complete 

once again. 

I used a black sharpie or black paint pen, can't remember,
both will work great, to write "have yourself a Merry little 

Christmas this year". That's something else I love about the 

creative process start with the supplies you have 

on hand before you plunge into spending

tons of money. 

Green paint and marker was added to the book pages, tree,

as well as the start was paint with hints of bright yellow.

I used this as a teacher gift for my 

daughters teacher one year. The plate stand was purchased 

from Hobby Lobby.

I love this look.