DIY Upgrade For Your Christmas Tree!

This year I got it into my head that I wanted a more natural looking, flocked Christmas tree. (Translation: fake snow on it. And maybe some pine cones.) Here's an example I found online:

This 7.5 foot tree costs over $400. Yee-OUCH.

So I started watching all the sales, and John and I hit every store we could think of, but all the artificial trees were either too tall (we like 6.5 foot trees), too expensive, or out of stock. Plus, the fake snow was always so flaky; bump it, and the powdery stuff goes everywhere!

Finally, I started thinking how we could reuse our burnt-out pre-lit tree from last year. It's a nice enough tree that we've had a few years, but half the light strands wired into it blew out, way beyond repair.

In the end, we went from this:
(minus the pine cones; I forgot to take a proper "before" pic)

To this!

Here's how we did it:

First, John spent a night painstakingly cutting off all of the pre-wired light strands. By the time he was done our living room carpet was littered with hundreds of plastic tie-clips - yikes!

Next I started researching fake snow kits. They exist, but start around $40 - too rich for my blood. Canned spray snow (which we dutifully purchased and tested) looks like chalky white spray paint; there's no texture or body to it, and it gets all over you if you brush up against it.

There are recipes online for mixing Elmer's glue with shaving cream, or Ivory soap flakes with glue, etc, but I didn't have those items on hand and I was convinced there had to be an easier way.

We finally decided to test slightly watered down lightweight drywall Spackle. (The lightweight part is very important - don't try this with heavy weight!)

Mixed up, it looks like this:

Using a stiff bristled chip brush, I did a test batch on a piece of garland:

Not bad! And once it dried it was nice and hard; no powdery residue, no shower of flakes.

Next John and I did some serious research into the flammability of this stuff - I don't want anyone burning their house down because of one of my tutorials! John even went so far as to take the garland outside and set it on fire. Which smelled so, so bad.

Bottom line: yes, it will burn (as will your artificial Christmas tree, if put in a direct flame) but no more so than anything else. Obviously it's not flame-retardant, but I'm comfortable saying your Christmas lights won't make the stuff ignite. (We also looked up the MSDS, the Material Safety Data Sheets, and found nothing to indicate any increased flammability. Expert opinions are still welcome, though!)

Now, before I could flock the tree I needed to attach my pine cones. Surprisingly, pine cones are really hard to find in stores! We found crushed potpourri-soaked ones, and a few small ones in floral sprigs, but that was it. Urg.

Finally we found an entire pine cone wreath at JoAnne's on sale down from $40 to $12. Even better, each of the 40+ pine cones already had a floral wire secured to the bottom. SOLD!

John disassembled the wreath and added more floral wire to each cone so I could attach them to the tree branches:

Then I attached them randomly around the tree:

Next came the fun part:

Painting the tree!

If you try this, don't be afraid to use a really heavy hand with your Spackle. The more clumpy it is, the better it looks! Concentrate the heavy clumps with a stippling motion on surface areas where snow would naturally fall, and then brush the branches around it to give them a lighter dusting of Spackle. If you're like me, you'll find yourself going back to add more and more with each pass as you see how nice it looks.

In fact, in the end I think our tree turned out WAY better than any flocked tree I've seen:

Also, to add a little sparkle, I stopped every five minutes or so and sprinkled white iridescent glitter all over the wet Spackle. It's a subtle glimmer - and ohmygosh so messy - but I think well worth it. Since the Spackle dries with a matte finish, the glitter adds a bit of shine.

To be honest, John and I were completely gobsmacked this came out as well as it did - and how easy it was to do! (Although I wouldn't let John do any of the painting. That was all me. :D)

And here she is again, in all her snowy glory:

I'm getting a total Narnia vibe. And I love it.

(Also notice Tonks down there rolling in all the excess glitter. Greeeeeaaat.)

I used two tiny batches of Spackle to do the entire 6.5 foot tree, and it took me maybe an hour. Since we already had the Spackle in the garage, the only expense was the $12 pine cones - and we got to salvage something destined for the trash! Now that's my kind of craft project.

This is only the beginning, though: this is going to be our steampunked Christmas tree, so we have much, MUCH more in store for it. And I am so excited. Stay tuned!

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* Want to see how my tree looks after being stored in the garage for a year? Updated pics here!

Then come see ALL of my craft projects on one page, right here!