Creating my own Winter Wonderland by Betsy

                                  Altered Art Winter Wonderland

I live in Minnesota. Cold and snow are a way of life. In fact, Minnesotans don't even think the weather is cold unless our nostrils freeze together when we inhale. (That's our own nostrils freezing together--our noses don't freeze to other random people's noses. Even though the extra body heat might be tempting, Minnesotans are too aloof to willy-nilly start cozying up to people walking down the street. Plus, just imagine people walking around with their noses frozen together. That's just weird.) Even though Minnesota winters often involve double-digit below zero temperatures and heart-attack inducing snowfalls, we currently are enjoying the warmest November on record. It is in the mid 70s here people.

The good news is that my solitary nose and the balmy weather has not stopped me from dreaming up some winter-themed craftiness, such as this Winter Wonderland Altered Art scene.

Tutorial to make Winter Wonderland

Since this will make a great holiday craft, I wanted to share with you how to make the Winter Wonderland Altered Art Scene.

Begin by assembling and gluing the joints of a 9" x 9" x 1" Cottage Base. Cover with white acrylic paint and let dry.

Before removing the excess chipboard, cover the bare branch trees with brown ink, the pine tree with green ink and the fence with black ink. Cut away the excess chipboard and assemble the deciduous trees.

Using the deciduous trees as a model cut a slit in one of the 6" pine trees from the top that extend about two-thirds of the way down the tree. Repeat on the second tree, except this time, beginning at the bottom. Slide the two trees together at the slot to create one three-dimensional tree.

Determine the placement of the trees, mark with a pencil and drill small holes through the Cottage Base.This is where you will run the lights for the trees. As you can see from the pictures below, originally I was going to wire the pine tree, but I later determined that the pine tree looked better without wires crisscrossing it, so I only wired the two deciduous trees.

Attach the trees and the fence using a strong glue. Then add the lights.

Next, assemble and paint the itsy-bitsy teeny-weeny bird house. Just look at how cute this thing is!

The next step is to add the snow to your base, fence and trees. Before the snow dries, add your deer.

Then, once everything is dry, add the birdhouse and cardinal.

You can house the battery packs for the lights beneath the cottage base. I pulled them out here so you can see them.

Great Stuff

Three 3D Chipboard Trees

Pine Tree Shape Set

Three Mini Wrought Iron Decorative Fences

Cottage Base

Little Bird House

Plastic Deer

Deco Art Snow Tex

Miniature Christmas Lights

Miniature Cardinal

White Acrylic Paint

Red Acrylic Paint

Beacon Fabri-tac

Vintage Photo Distress Ink

Black Soot Distress Ink

Forest Moss Distress Ink