Sparkly Unicorn Diamond Art

I'm doing something I've never done before - posting a Christmas gift on my blog before giving it to the recipient. In this case, however, the recipient is my 6-year old niece, Allison, and I'm fairly confident she doesn't read my blog unsupervised. Not only that, but I kinda already told her what the gift would be. In fact, I posted a picture of Allison (and my godson Teagan) helping me with Allison's gift when we visited back in July.

So Allison knew that I would be taking the completed unicorn Diamond Art and turning it into something sparkly and fabulous for her, but she didn't know exactly what. Neither did I, to be honest! I debated all sorts of options before settling on wall art. I think she's going to like it. I wish you could see just how sparkly it is! Affiliate links below.

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Sparkly Unicorn Diamond Art

Materials:

• Sparkle Art Rainbow Ombre Unicorn
• Plaid Wood Canvas Panel
• Folk Art paint - Licorice
• Folk Art Extreme Glitter paint - black
• glittered cardstock
• glittered letter stickers
• glittered heart stickers

Steps: 

Complete the unicorn, following the instructions on the package. Use microtip scissors to carefully cut it out. 

Paint the wood canvas with black paint. When it is dry, add a coat of Extreme Glitter. The more coats you add, the more sparkly it gets. I did two coats and got tons of sparkle. (Allison likes sparkle. It's practically a requirement for being a 6-year old girl to love glitter in all its forms.)

Cut the cardstock to size, then use a strong craft glue to attach it to the inside of the wood canvas. Use the same glue to attach the unicorn, alphabet letters, and heart(s) to the cardstock.

Diamond Art makes a fantastic gift for practically anyone on your gift list. My favorite diamond art manufacturer, Leisure Arts, has a huge (and growing) number of designs to choose from. If someone on your list would prefer to receive a completed design instead of doing it themselves, you have plenty of time to make this thoughtful gift before the holidays.

Footprint Unicorn

It's been awhile since I've shared a footprint craft. I used to do them with Trevor all the time to preserve his tiny feet in my memory. His feet are no longer tiny. He's just a little bit shorter than me and his feet are about the same size as mine. 

Trevor is not into unicorns. This footprint unicorn was inspired by my niece, Allison, who lives and breathes unicorns. Her feet, small and cute, are 600+ miles away from me now, so I had to use my own foot for my craft. Affiliate links below. 

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Footprint Unicorn

Materials:

• construction paper (white, pink, purple)
• scissors
• Sharpie
• large googly eyes
• sparkly yarn
• craft glue

Steps: 

Trace your foot on a piece of white construction paper. This will be the unicorn's head. Cut it out, then trace your arm on the large white scrap. This will be the unicorn's neck. Cut it out. Cut two ears and two nostrils from the remaining white scraps. 

Cut a horn from pink construction paper. Cut two inner ears from the pink scraps.

Lay strips of purple diagonally on the horn, glue them in place, and then trim the excess. Cut two eyelids from the purple scraps.

Cut a bunch of yarn pieces approximately 2" long. The easiest way to do this is to wrap the yarn many times around the fingers of one of your hands, then cut it on both sides of your hand to get pieces all the same length. Set aside 2/3 of the yarn to use for the mane. Tie one piece of yarn around the remaining yarn to make a tight bundle. 

Glue one strand from the bundle behind the middle toe of the cut-out foot. 

Glue the ears and the horn in place, then bring the yarn bundle forward and arrange it to make the forelock. 

Use the sharpie to darken the nostrils, to draw a mouth, and to add eyelashes to the eyelids. Glue the eyes, eyelids, and nostrils to the unicorn's face. Glue the remaining yarn to the back of the neck. Finally, glue the unicorn's head to the neck. 

You can't see the sparkle in the yarn very well in the photo, but I love how it looks in real life. Change out the yarn with pastels, or bright rainbow colors, or whatever you prefer. With a mythical creature, there's definitely no right or wrong!

Gallery Glass: Unicorn Sun Catcher

Check out my unicorn sun catcher! 

The Plaid Ambassadors each received the Gallery Glass Sun Catcher Kit (affiliate link here and throughout the post) to play with. I'd never tried Gallery Glass before. The verdict? Super fun!

To make your own sun catcher, you need Simulated Liquid Leading, Gallery Glass Window Color, and Stencil Blanks. It also helps to have the design you want drawn out. The Sun Catcher Kit comes with a large idea book so I used that, but you can use coloring pages or draw your own designs instead. 

Place a stencil blank over your design. Trace the lines with Simulated Liquid Leading. There is a learning curve to this. At least, there was for me. You can see my first attempt here. Obviously, I wasn't keeping the pressure steady, nor letting gravity work for me.  

I did some more practicing before moving on to the pineapple, my fifth shape and the first that turned out well. The key was to think of the leading like frosting a cookie. Pipe with even pressure, holding the tip just above the surface, and let the leading fall gently into place. 

I drew a few more shapes, including the unicorn at the top of the post. In all, I made a dozen window catchers and there's hardly a dent in my 8 oz. bottle. 

Let the leading dry for at least 8 hours. I left mine overnight. Then fill in the spaces with the Window Color. It is much more fluid than the leading, but not enough to self-level. You want to fill in all the spaces so that they're almost overflowing. It looks like I filled in the pineapple completely...

... but once it dried, it's obvious that I didn't quite fill it all in.

Anyway, fill in all the spaces as full as you can get them. If any bubbles show up, poke them with a pin or a toothpick. Let the Window Color dry for at least 8 hours. 

When it is dry, gently peel the design off of the Stencil Blank. Then attach it to a window. You can remove it and reposition it as often as you want. 

Oh, the possibilities! I'm imagining all sorts of holiday and seasonal window catchers decorating the windows at Casa deRosier. Any suggestions for other things you'd like me to make with Gallery Glass? Better yet, try it yourself!