{Book Page & Washi Tape Decorated Ornament}

Hey, y'all!  I know what you're thinking.  "Two posts in two days from Pitter and Glink?"  Yep.  It's your early Christmas present from me.  Just kidding.  ;)  I did a lot of Christmas crafting lately, but in usually Bethany fashion, I didn't really plan ahead to spread out my posts evenly.  So here we are with a week and some change left before Christmas, and I have quite a few tutorials to squeeze in before the big day.  I mean, you don't expect me to post an ornament tutorial in January do you?  So today I want to share a cute ornament I made my handmade gift exchange partner, who just so happens to be an English teacher like me.  (I posted the DIY Christmas Pendant I made for her yesterday.)  

I must admit to you ahead of time that I got into the "zone" when making this ornament, and I didn't exactly take pictures of each individual step.  #BloggerFail  But I promise the pictures I do have are more than enough to explain the process of making this ornament.  So here we go…

This ornament began its life as a plain paper mache ornament from the craft store.  I painted the edges with primer (gesso), and then I traced both sides of it on book pages.  (Be sure to trace both sides of an ornament like this because the shape is not uniform.)  I cut the traced shapes out.  I used Mod Podge to attach the book pages to the ornament, and I brushed a coat of Mod Podge over the paper to seal it.

When that dried, I painted the edges of the ornament with metallic gold paint.  (It would have been easier to do this before I Mod Podged on the book pages, but I often seem to enjoy doing things backwards.) I then made washi tape "stripes" on the ornament.  I applied the tape to the ornament and then used a craft knife to carefully trim off the excess tape.  I used hot glue to attach a felt poinsettia that I bought at the craft store, and the ornament was finished.

I thought it was so funny that my gift exchange partner knew what book the book pages came from!

The cool thing is that she actually teaches the story to her students!  Serendipity, my friends.  Christmas serendipity.