Celebrate Green Blog

by Lynn

I can go for months without an original craft idea and then one day, POW! Something hits me like a brick (but in a good way).

That’s what happened last week when my friend Suzanne (owner of the fabulous spot for crafty buying, Pennywise Arts), came for a crafting date.

Suzanne arrived armed with a project while I had, well, nada.

Corey’s birthday was coming up though and I wanted to make her a card.

Of course with me, the word “card,” has a wildly expanded definition. It’s not simply a paper conveyer of good wishes, but can be made from anything, and when it comes to me, paper is generally far down the list.

But what to make it from?

As I scanned the shelves in my studio, my eyes lit on a wood cheese box and a couple of smaller round mint tins.

Round…decreasing sizes…birthday cake!

Soon I was at work cutting paper to glue around the “layers,” and adding embellishments. A half hour later, I had a beautifully decorated three layer cake that I couldn’t have baked if I’d had a million years—even in miniature!

When I finished making the cake, I realized it needed a stand.

Right in front of me on the table was the bottom half of a plastic water filter I’d removed from the shower and refused to throw away.

That would be the base.

I remembered I had a beautiful glass drawer pull—somewhere! Incredibly, once I unearthed it, it fit perfectly into the top of the water filter. Glued it in leaving the part that would normally screw to the drawer facing up. That enabled me to add a “plate.” Since I didn’t have one, I drew a circle on cardboard, cut it out and covered it with a paper doily cut to size.

I cut and pleated another doily to fit around the water filter, creating a “skirt,” and covered the tape I used with glass beads that matched what I’d done on one of the cake layers.

For the candle holder, I found a small wooden block with a hole already in it. I broke off a toothpick, painted the bottom to match the cake and the top yellow and orange for flames, glued the candle in the block, added microbeads for decoration and set it atop the cake.

As it turned out, I hadn’t made a card at all, but rather a box into which I am putting a very special and meaningful gift. (Can’t tell you what it is because she might read this before I present it to her.)

Happy birthday my sweet!

Lynn Colwell and Corey Colwell-Lipson are mother and daughter and authors of Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family, and founders of Green Halloween®.