Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Seeing Red: My Retro Valentine

Truthfully, the thought of celebrating Valentine's Day does not make me swoon with passion. Think "Once I had a love and it was a gas. Soon turned out to be a pain in the ass."

That being said, it is an opportunity to give and receive chocolate.

And, it's an impetus for starting a creative decorating project in January, the coldest, darkest, dullest month of the year in these parts.

On a recent visit to a Michael's Arts & Crafts store, I found boxes of glass heart ornaments on clearance, and thought, "Why not create a Heart of Glass tree for Valentine's Day?"

As anyone who has known me or visited my home will attest, I've been a fan of the band Blondie ever since Heart of Glass hit the airwaves back in 1979, so this tree is not too much of a stretch for me.

My Funky Retro Valentine Room

The Love Rug

Every Christmas I put up a two-foot silver tinsel tree in my home office. After taking off my silver mini snowflake ornaments and mini candy canes, I decided to reuse it as my Heart of Glass tree.

Heart of Glass tree unplugged

I started with a string of 50 red LED lights I found on clearance at a local drugstore. I then xeroxed images from my collection of Blondie coffee table books and resized them to fit on the clear glass ornaments. I used gloss acrylic medium to decoupage the images. For accents I used silver or white glitter as well as pink "duck tape" I found at my neighborhood art supply store.

Heart of Glass tree all lit up.
The felt flower on top is from Target, as are the red and white paper doilies.

Ornaments closeup – ooh ooh OH!

For some of the ornaments I used found objects I already had on hand, including conversation heart stickers and red glitter glue.

Conversation Heart ornament
"Love Ya" written in red glitter glue on top of a white paper doily.





I also used some of my mini Blondie buttons for finishing touches.



OK, now I'm feeling the love.