We all have special memories, scents and/or special ornaments that mean Christmas to us. One of my fondest memories that Christmas was coming was going downtown with my mother and sister (yes, Virginia, before conglomerate malls, people did dress up and go into ‘town’) to look at the window displays in the large department stores. They were truly wonders to behold. Designers would go to great lengths to create engaging displays with mechanical toys and charming villages that glittered and glowed with hundreds of lights, fake snow and bows everywhere while music poured out of loudspeakers to draw you into their store. In mimic of this confectioned delight, one could go to the five and dime and purchase little villages made out of painted chipboard and adorned with lots of glitter and mica snow to display on mantles or tabletops festooned in batting and bottle brush trees sprayed with flocking. Of course some of them even had holes in the back to put lights in so your village could glow or candles awaited the anticipated eve to be lit for Santa to see when he came to deposit his goods under your tree.
 | Glitter Village 2 Advanced Project Zoom in to view this project closer Make this project: |
Even though those days are as vivid as ever in my memory file, they are gone to us unless we happen to live close or in a very large city that still boasts a downtown. However, we can recreate some of that magic at home with some very basic scrapbooking supplies, the patterns provided below and a little imagination. To keep it a bit simple, I have provided instructions for just using a heavy cardstock as your foundation, but I just couldn’t help myself, I had to collage antique ledger papers and sheet music to my chipboard before stamping and glittering. If you prefer this look, as well, just glue some vintage papers to lightweight chipboard, scumble over with a bit of watered down gesso so you don’t obliterate all of the typography of your vintage papers and proceed with the instructions as written.
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Feel free to turn this into your own project, too, by changing or adding anything to your designs that speaks Christmas art to you. You could turn this into a fun weekend family project, as well, by inviting the kids to pitch in with the decorating of the cardstock. You could put family photos in the windows to turn this into memory art that you and your family will cherish for Christmases to come. And don’t forget to read all the way to the bottom because I have included some bonus instructions for making what I call cupcake glitter trees and a button garland.
So, have fun, make a memory and happy holidays to you and yours.
For the FREE Glitter Village patterns, click here.
To find the products mentioned in this article and shown in these layouts, check with your local scrapbook retailer. Browse our Premier Retail Stores for coupons to a store near you.
I am a self-taught artist. When folk art, decorative art and t-shirt painting were all the rage, I owned a folk art supply/teaching shop. When I became obsessed with collage and the paper arts, I began working exclusively in this genre until I started designing my own fabric creations and art quilts. I have taught workshops both locally and on the national level and have exhibited my collage artwork in various galleries, including a show in Dallas, Texas. My publications include projects and articles for many Somerset Studio publications. I was also a featured artist in Making Wreaths in Minutes for Sterling’s Red Lips for Courage book line and have been published in smaller venues, which include other local arts, stamping and scrapbook publications, including the fabulous Pasticcio Quartz ‘Zine. Check out my etsy store to view more of my work http://artboxstudio.etsy.com.
