Sparkly Christmas Tree Tutorial

I made a little sparkly Christmas tree today - although it's hard to see the sparkles in the pictures.  But medium cut German Glass glitter in clear was used and it really does sparkle in the light.  All you need is:

A spool and a dowel

If your dowel doesn't fit tightly into your spool,

you can tape a tiny nail to the bottom side of the dowel

Be sure to use a nail with no head

Then glue the dowel into the spool and it will fit tightly

Cover the sides of your spool with glue

and sprinkle heavily with the German glass glitter

Then let dry before you begin putting the coffee filters over the dowel

A few unbleached coffee filters

I think I ended up using about five or six

and my tree is eight inches high including the spool

Cut through the coffee filter to the center and then cut the center out

(I put several coffee filters together before cutting)

Wad the centers up into a ball, straighten them out,

then cut scallops around the edges

(these don't have to be perfect)

Cut the fluted coffee filter edge into pieces big enough

to cut a circle out of

Depending upon the size of your spool,

the coffee filter bottoms (that you scalloped)

should be big enough for the bottom of the tree

cut smaller circles as you go,

putting eight to ten of each size circle on the dowel

(again this will depend upon how tall you make your dowel)

fold the circle in half and snip the center

(so it will fit over the dowel)

Cut two stars out of the coffee filter centers to fit the top of your tree

Cut a tiny square from a little piece of white cloth or cardstock

Put dabs of glue around the edges of your circles

and dip them into German glass glitter

Shake them off and put them on your dowel

with the sparkly side up

starting with the larger circles at the bottom

and smaller circles going up the tree to the top

Leave a little room at the top of your dowel for the star

Put glue all over one side of the star and dip in German glass glitter

Glue one square of cloth or cardstock in the middle of 

the non-glitter side of your star

Place a dab of glue on the cloth/cardstock and glue to dowel

You'll have one star on each side of dowel

Then you can put a teeny dab of glue on each of the top three star points

and glue them together.

Add a ribbon to the spool if you wish

and even a sequin or 'jewel' to the middle of the star

And by the way, Diana at Splinters And Rags is where I've always bought my German glass glitter.  She's great to work with and has loads of colors and types as well as mica and other items.  Her store and email is here:  http://splintersandrags.com/ and her Ebay store is here:  http://stores.ebay.com/Splinters-and-Rags-Crafts