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Thursday, December 4, 2014

Make a Snowflake Ornament from Keys

It's Day 4 of our Christmas Blog Tour and today's topic is christmas crafts.  Right up my alley :)

make these amazing snowflakes from old keys, the altered past blog


Remember the huge bucket of old keys my father-in-law gave me?



Yeah, it was a bunch.  I played around with them and came up with this idea for a Christmas ornament and I really like how it turned out.

For this project, you'll need:

6 long keys (like those used for doors)
12 short keys (like the ones used for locks and cabinets)
a thick piece of cardboard or mat board
a strong adhesive like E6000 or Liquid Nails
white spray paint
white iridescent glitter
Mod Podge
12 inch piece of fishing line

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog


Begin by place the 6 long keys into a circle with the heads on the inside and the grooves pointing out. Next, pair up 6 sets of the 12 short keys so that the lengths are fairly equal to each other.  Now take each pair, stack the two keys one on top of the other and form a V.  Each "V" is now placed on top of the 6 long keys.  You should now have 6 sets of 3 stacked keys, 1 long key and 2 short keys.





You may want to play around with the different groupings to get a balanced look with the varying shapes and lengths.

Once you like the design, begin gluing each set with the adhesive.  They will still be 6 separate sets right now.  While the glue is drying, take the cardboard (or mat board) and cut into a circle big enough to glue the "snowflake" to but not so big that it can be seen from the front of the "snowflake".  Spray paint it white (if it isn't already).  Now that the glue on the keys has dried, glue the "snowflake" to the cardboard.  On top of the cardboard piece, place the key stacks in a circle with the small keys on the bottom and long keys on top.  You can place a small weight on top of the ring to press it against the keys until the glue dries.

Now that everything is glued and the glue is dried, you're ready to spray paint the whole snowflake white.  If your keys are rusty, you may want to use spray primer first, then your white paint.  The rust will bleed through just the white paint.

That could be the end of the snowflake but don't we need a little glitter?!

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog


Yep, I thought so.  Much better!  Paint the entire snowflake with Mod Podge then douse with white iridescent glitter!!  Beautiful!

Now, to add the fishing line to hang the snowflake with.  I used a hot glue gun (because it's faster) to attach the fishing line to the back of the cardboard.  Here's a little trick to make the snowflake hang straight and not tip forward because of the weight.

Attach the fishing line at a second spot on the back of the upper most key.  This will be the key that will point straight up when hung.  See photo.



It's ready to hang!  Check it out!!

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog

beautiful snowflake made from old keys, the altered past blog


I hope you liked this craft for repurposing old keys!  Be sure to check out the other blogs today!



Thanks for stopping by and God bless!
Angie


7 comments:

  1. Angie what a super fantastic way to repurposed these old keys and I love that you added the glitter! These are awesome!

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    1. Thanks CoCo! I'm usually not a big glitter person but glitter added the BAM to this project, lol!

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  2. Angie - your creativity knows no bounds! I really love old keys but I've never seen anything like this. Your glittery snowflakes are perfection!

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    1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    2. Thanks Vicki! I normally don't use glitter but I added it to these and I really l-i-k-e-d it :)

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  3. If you have any more buckets of old keys, I'm happy to take them off your hands! This idea would also make a cool tree topper with two ornaments together done double sided. Hmmm ~ now if I just had those keys :-) Great idea Angie!!

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    Replies
    1. I'm sure I could come up with some extras!! And, that's a great idea to make a two sided tree topper!!

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