The Christmas themed posts have started early, I guess!  Last year, we made a modern wreath (Week 49, and STILL hanging on my door) and personalized Christmas ornaments (Week 51).  The haste this year was that I needed something fun for my table at Show of Hands.

Meet the maker – hiding behind the table.  The comic sans abecediary should NOT be in this photo.  It was  joke one I didn’t even realize was on the table.

I have occasionally made Christmas ornaments for sale at shows, but they never went well – I didn’t have a good display method for them.   Since Show of Hands is the only show I’m doing this season, I wanted to display them better and actually sell them, since I don’t offer them on-line.  My tables for the show were an “L” shape, so I devised two large trees that would hold a curtain rod over the useless triangle between them.

Awesome Laser embroidery made by Brandi of Peekaboo Stitches. Green paint job by me.

Ryan picked out the most Christmas-y green spray paint he could find, and I painted four sheets of 16×24″ plywood.  It really sucked up the paint, and there was an emergency run to get a second can to finish the job.  The big trees were 22 inches tall – I wanted them to be quite noticeable.  I cut a small divot in the very top so it could hold a half inch rod.

Here’s the best shot I got of the halved joint.

The design was based on a pair of drape-y chandelier earrings that never made it to it to production because, honestly, it looked too much like a Christmas tree to me.  Perfect for this!  To make them 3D and to get them to stand on their own, I used the “halved joint” again – same as in Week 51 for the ornaments.  It’s more complicated to explain than it is – basically a slot that runs half the depth of the where you want two pieces to join, with a slot coming from the opposite side on the second piece.  You just slide them together to assemble, and are able to be stored flat – a huge bonus when carting around table displays.

Adorable Cookie by Dough and A Dear with and huge abecediary and small tree as backdrop

Trees are triangular shapes, and can waste a lot of wood when cut out of a square blank.  We used the extra space to make mini trees, which in the end were 7 inches tall, so not too tiny!  They made fantastic accent pieces on the table and were great to lean earrings (and cookies!) against.  I was very pleased with how my table turned out.  I ended up selling the small trees right off the table, and packed up the big ones to go in Orange Beautiful‘s shop in Chicago, if you want to see them in person.

cute little set up!

It would have been a little more ideal with a backdrop of some sort to hide behind the scenes storage…next time 🙂