christmas – Melodrama

DIY Mid-Century Inspired Felt No-Sew Tree Skirt

Published on December 19, 2018December 19, 2018 by Krys11 Comments

One of my favorite things to do each year is make new no-sew felt tree skirts. They’re super easy and fun to make and don’t require any skills except being able to use scissors and glue.

You can see past tutorials with measurements and instructions here and here, and my latest space age themed one here.

For my main tree (the pink tree) I wanted to bring in colorful shapes based on a vintage Christmas cards I fell in love with.

I used the images to create templates and then used my Cricut to cut out the shapes, but you can totally use scissors!

And there it is! Go ahead and play with sizing and adding some other little embellishments to make it your own design!

Be sure to tag @melodrama or #krysmasgram on Instagram to show me what you made!

DIY Mid-Century Inspired Colorful Metallic Sputnik Ornaments

Published on December 12, 2018December 12, 2018 by Krys8 Comments

When I was gathering decorations for my space age tree I knew I wanted to try and find some vintage or retro style colorful sputnik ornaments. Unfortunately my search game up empty for exactly what I was looking for in my price range, so I got crafty with an easy DIY version.

I gathered everything I needed from my local craft store including:

Mini wooden dowels
Metallic round beads (the dowels should fit perfectly into the bead)
Glitter Styrofoam Ball Vase Filler
Metallic washi tape
Metallic embroidery thread
Craft glue

First create a loop with a piece of embroidery thread and insert both ends through the bead opening. Next, insert the mini wooden dowel into the bead opening. This should hold the thread in place.

Then wrap the wooden dowel in metallic washi tape. The best way to do this is cut strips the length of the dowel and wrap it lengthwise like you’re rolling a j….nevermind you get the idea ;).

Finally dip the end of the dowel into craft glue and insert the dowels into the styrofoam ball in a sputnik type pattern.

You’ll end up with ornaments like this!

Told you it was easy! Get creative with colors and patterns! Be sure to tag me at @melodrama or use the hashtag #krysmasgram on Instagram to show me your creations!

DIY No-Sew Retro Atomic Space Age Tree Skirt

Published on December 12, 2018 by Krys10 Comments

One of my favorite things to do each year is make new no-sew felt tree skirts. They’re super easy and fun to make and don’t require any skills except being able to use scissors and glue. You can see past tutorials with measurements and instructions here and here.

This year I needed something to match my office’s retro space age theme, so I used flying saucers and atomic shapes like boomerangs and starbursts.

I used the method detailed here to cut my skirt out of green felt. Then I cut my shapes out of sheets of different colored felts. I used silver metallic rick rack to add rays to my flying saucers and shiny snowflake starburst buttons for a little extra shine. I finished off the edges with silver metallic fringe! I always use standard craft glue to adhere all of it.

Here are the shapes I used to make your felt cutting life a little easier! Print on a standard piece of paper. (Opt to scale to fit paper on your print settings if possible.)

Tada!

Make sure to tag @melodrama or use the hashtag #krysmasgram on Instagram to show me your creations!

DIY Retro Inspired Christmas Space Age Reindeer

Published on December 12, 2018December 15, 2018 by Krys12 Comments

As you saw from my previous post I went full on atomic space age for my home office. I had to do a few DIYs to make it exactly what I wanted it to be, but my favorite is probably this astrodeer!

This project required some Frankenstein style surgery, but I’m really thrilled with the way it turned out. Here’s what I did!

Supplies

Paper Mache Deer
6.5″ Round Glass Terrarium
Aluminum Foil Tape
Utility Blade
Hot Glue
Craft Glue
Silver Tinsel Garland
Silver Tinsel Stems
Craft paper or paper bags

Ok I’m going to admit right now I didn’t take process photos because I’m the worst and I wasn’t even sure it was going to work, BUT luckily it’s a pretty straight forward process. (Note: I’m going to make one for a friend so I’ll try to update this post with photos when I do!)

In order to get the deer’s head into the terrarium, but still have the helmet in the position I wanted, I had to make cuts on the points shown below.

I added paper ears and eyes and placed the head in the terrarium. Once the head was in the terrarium (from here on known as the helmet) I reattached the bottom part of the antlers, and the upper part of the neck with craft glue and used chopsticks to help get where I had trouble reaching. Once it was dry, I used wet strips of paper bag and glue to cover the cut seams.

Then I used hot glue to attach the rest of the antler to the top of the helmet, and the helmet to body. I used a black sharpie to draw on the hooves and a nose, then I covered the body in foil tape, and covered all the glue joints with tinsel wire and garlands.

There it is! My new spacey pet. Isn’t he a cutie?

Retro Mid-Century Atomic Space Age Christmas Decor Theme

Published on December 10, 2018December 12, 2018 by Krys18 Comments

Ahhh I am so excited to show you our home office’s Christmas theme!! I’ve had this retro sci-fi idea floating around in my mind forever and I’m so glad I was able to pull it all together. I was in a pretty serious car accident in November, so for a moment I didn’t think I’d be able to rally in time to make this happen, but I was able to work it out and I’m super happy with the result.

I was inspired by the atomic and space age depictions of Christmas popular in the mid 20th century. Think Christmas cards with Santa riding a rocket, flying saucer shaped Shiny Brites, and even movies like Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. Unfortunately, it was a difficult task finding the appropriate items to deck my halls in this theme, aside from one or two retro style ornaments I found at Michael’s. Fortunately I was able to craft my way through enough projects to make it pretty much exactly what I had in mind.

I’ll be following this post up with others detailing the DIY crafts I did with links to materials, so stay tuned for that. For now let me take you on a little tour of the room!

Since it’s a small room I needed a tree that wouldn’t overwhelm the space. I went with this slim white tree from Treetopia which fits nicely. It has white lights, but my vintage Norelco color wheel adds some festive color to it as well.

One of my favorite Christmas crafts to do each year is to make custom no-sew tree skirts. You can see examples of that here and here. This year was no exception! For this one I used ufos, boomerang shapes, and starbursts, finished off with silver metallic fringe.

To decorate the tree I used blue and gold star wired garland and a variety of starburst ornaments I’ve collected over the years.

Of course I used some of my vintage reflector ornaments and threaded ball fringe comets.I found a few fitting ornaments at Michaels like a flying saucer, rocket Santa, and an aluminum tray TV dinner (space age technology!).I also made colorful sputnik ornaments (look for those in an upcoming post!)

And I even added a space helmet (an empty craft ornament) to Frosty!

I found an astronaut nutcracker and gave him an aluminum tree to decorate. This is just three craft cones of different sizes covered in foil tape and stacked!Another rocket Santa! Made out of a bird feeder, metallic tape, and mini ornaments.

And my new pet, my favorite Christmas creation of all time, my space deer! He’s made out of a papier mache deer and a round terrarium.

Over on the shelves we’ve got some spacey aluminum and vintage Shiny Brites.

I found this vintage space Santa image and had it enlarged and printed. It even has space reindeer!

Looks pretty good over by our 1960 Philco Predicta.

And there it is! I hope you liked the tour!

Stay tuned for a followup post of details on the DIYs and all the resources.

Melodramaville Christmas Home Tour 2017

Published on December 23, 2017 by Krys9 Comments

Merry Christmas!

Ok you guys, I’ve always been obsessed with Christmas. Decorating Christmas trees is in my top 5 favorite hobbies of all time and I look forward to it every year. Normally we get a real tree, but this year we decided to go with a colorful artificial tree and skip the hassle of hunting one down and getting into the stand, etc etc. Turns out it was still a hassle because I went through 3 rotating stands, none of which worked, and ended up having to redecorate the tree a couple of times because of that. It still turned out cute in the end though!

Pink tree! Vintage ornaments! DIY tree skirt!

Every year I make a wreath for the front door. This year I made a cellophane wreath which was a popular mid-century craft.I also made throw pillows inspired by my favorite vintage ornaments.

I have a serious addiction to bottle brush trees. And I couldn’t leave out my DIY Putz houses of course!It’s a house rule that every room needs at least one tree in it.

I definitely cried a little when I decorated this tree. It’s the one we use to hold all of our special ornaments that we’ve collected on trips and for special occasions. We’ve experienced tremendous loss this year and we miss so many people, but these ornaments also remind us of the really, really good times and memories they hold. Sending all my love to everyone who has a hard time around this time of year. Be gentle on yourselves and hang in there. Try to continue making good memories even though it hurts right now. One day when it doesn’t hurt as bad you’ll be grateful you did I also took advantage of the vintage inspired ceramic trees that Target had this year, for those rooms that couldn’t fit a full size tree.

I hope you all have a splendid Christmas!

DIY Vintage Christmas Ornament Throw Pillow

Published on December 8, 2017December 8, 2017 by KrysLeave a comment

If you don’t know by now, I’m totally obsessed with vintage Christmas ornaments.

My favorites are the ones with the indented reflectors in the middle. I just love how unique each one is and how they sparkle and reflect colors when hanging on a lit up tree. It’s magical! You might remember that Ornament Tree Skirt I made a couple of years ago, but this year I wanted to bring that theme to life as a throw pillow.

What you’ll need:

-Fabric. (The amount depends on the size of pillow you want to make. I used fleece, but you can use any non-stretchy fabric you want. I got two 18″ pillows out of 2 yards of 45″ wide fleece.)
–Metal Christmas light reflector cups
-1” Silver buttons
-Snowfake shaped crafting buttons
–Metallic Braid Trim
-Ribbons, rickrack, and felt/fabric to decorate
-Embroidery thread and long needle
-Fabric glue
-Sewing Machine and thread (or you can glue the edges for a no-sew attempt)

What you do:

First draw a circle. The best way to do this is to use a tape measure or ruler and the compass method. Remember the way we learned in math class? HA I bet you thought you’d never need that. Then sketch out a little top piece (about 5″ wide), like an ornament would have. Then cut it out!

Sew the edges together leaving an opening at the top. Turn it right side out and iron. Stuff with polyfill through the top and then close the opening using a slipstitch. (You can try gluing all of these edges for a no-sew attempt, but the results won’t be as clean.)

In order to make the indented middle you need to tuft. Use a silver button and a light reflector to do this. Put the silver button in the middle of the reflector and use embroidery thread and a long needle to pull the button and reflector through the middle of the pillow. Pull it tight to make the indent, and use a triple knot to make it stay. Trim the excess thread. You can also use another button on the other side to keep it all in place if the triple knot isn’t enough.

Now you can have fun decorating it! Glue the snowflake buttons around the indent for extra sparkle. Use the metallic trim around the top to make it look like the ornament cap. Use rickrack, ribbons, and fabric scraps to create lines and shapes.

And voila! A cute little ornament throw pillow!

DIY Cellophane and Bottle Brush Tree Wreath

Published on December 4, 2017December 4, 2017 by Krys4 Comments

In this installment of Krys’s craft corner I’m bringing back an oldie but a goodie. When I was a kid I always made some version of a DIY wreath using a coat hanger and some sort of household product like tissue paper, felt, plastic bags, or in this case cellophane.

This is a totally retro craft that was really popular in post-war households. During the 50s and 60s companies like Alcoa, Reynolds, DuPont, and 3M sent out pamphlets full of ways to use their plastic and foil products for other household uses such as holiday crafts, including cellophane wreaths. They were usually dressed up with foil flowers and an electric candle stick. Companies even sold them already made, for the non-DIY crowd.

(photo: Etsy)

There are a few different ways to make these wreaths. You can use a wire hanger and shape it into a circular shape, or you can do what I did and buy a metal floral hoop. Most ready-made versions were made by layering round, crimped pieces of red cellophane (almost like cupcake wrappers), but other versions and the easier DIY method are made by tying strips of cellophane to a metal ring.

What You’ll Need:

-a metal floral hoop or a wire hanger shaped into a circle

-cellophane in your color choice, cut into strips approximately 1″ wide by 7″ long

(I used a 14″ wire wreath form, and 3 rolls of cellophane wrap)

I unrolled the wrap on my floor and cut strips 1 inch wide. Then I cut those strips into 7″ long pieces.

Crumple up the strips to give them more texture. Then tie them onto the metal ring. Push each piece tight against the last.

Continue working all the way around until the metal hoop is completely covered.

Instead of the traditional candle stick I used dyed bottle brush trees from Distinguished Flamingo.

And thats it! Use a ribbon or a wreath hanger to put it on your door or in your windows.

DIY No-Sew Mid-Century Inspired Christmas Tree Skirt

Published on November 27, 2017November 27, 2017 by Krys7 Comments

It’s that time again! Christmas time! I love this time of year. No matter what is going on in life, good or bad, decorating my Christmas tree always cheers me up. This year we switched things up a bit and used our fake pink tree instead of trying to find a natural, flocked one here in the desert. We even got a rotating stand so the whole thing spins!

I badly needed a new tree skirt since my last DIY one got ruined during our move. Wahhh.

I used the same tutorial and materials as my previous no-sew felt Christmas tree skirt (pictured above), and put a different spin on it.

First you need a couple yards of 72″ felt. Then you make a circle in your desired size. I explain this in more detail here.

Then use pieces of felt in various colors to create curved rhombus shapes that were popular in the 50s and 60s.

Like so!

Then just simply use fabric glue to adhere them to the felt skirt in whatever pattern you desire.

And there you have it! A quick and easy DIY tree skirt for your retro tree.

Happy tree trimming!

Be sure to tag your Christmas photos with #Krysmasgram on Instagram!

Treetopia Ice Cream Social – National Ice Cream Month Themed Holiday Trees

Published on July 14, 2017July 17, 2017 by Krys11 Comments

I know, I know…a Christmas tree in July?!

In case you didn’t already know, July is National Ice Cream Month! To celebrate I’ve teamed up with Treetopia (who believe their trees don’t have to be limited to one holiday!) and five other bloggers to bring you sugary sweet ice cream themed holiday tree ideas.

What’s even sweeter? Treetopia is giving you the chance to win special treats through their social media giveaway, and brand ambassador, Jen Perkins’ Facebook live contest!

Ready for my ice cream themed creation?

Tada!

I started with a pink lighted tree from Treetopia, of course, and decorated it with DIY ice cream ornaments and ice cream string lights.

I used tissue paper to create pastel scoops and placed them in real sugar cones and cute ice cream cups.

Then I used colorful mini marshmallows and candies to decorate them!For snow cones I used tissue paper and party hats!

For extra sweetness I used twine and taffy to make little filler ornaments.

By the way, the pastel pink tree gets even pinker once you turn on the pink lights!

Can’t forget the sprinkles! I filled Treetopia’s iridescent ornaments with rainbow sprinkles! To top it all off I used the rest of my tissue paper and a party hat to make a giant ice cream cone.