Friends, Flora, and Fauna

I am making ornaments for a nature friendly, 'edible' Christmas tree. I am part of the Franciscan Team at work and I volunteered to decorate one of the twenty Christmas trees scattered throughout the student union. It is a competition between campus organizations. As un-Christian and un-Franciscan as it might sound...I WANT TO WIN!!!! But mostly - I REALLY need to learn how NOT to volunteer.

Since St. Francis of Assisi is the patron saint of animals and the college I work for is a Franciscan university, I wanted to incorporate our native wildlife without me having to prowl the 100 acres of native prairie grasslands adjoining campus for sprouts, sprigs, and other such makeshift 'ornaments'. So then I thought  -  why not have the animals come to us? What better way to do that than with smorgasboard tree? We share our campus with dozens of deer, turkey, squirrels, and many, many birds of flight on a daily basis. We might as well give them a Merry Christmas meal too!

Here is my plan: star shaped cookie cutters of sliced white bread, orange slices, cranberry strings, and some nuts. In keeping with the all natural theme - I'll be using 100% cotton thread and jute twine to string up the creations. The tree will be inside until the Christmas break - then I'll move the 'yummy' treats off of the artificial tree to an outdoor tree for 'all God's creatures great and small'. Here is a picture of the stars. I'll keep you posted on the rest of the produce ornaments. Let me know if you have any other suggestions for me to add to the edible list!

Here are three of the 120 stars.

While I had the stars in the oven for some dry-time I managed to put the finishing touches on this card.

Friends in the Garden
~Base card PaperTrey Ink - Kraft cardstock
~Layer of Colorbok Cafe' au Lait
~Layer of light green cardstock with coordinating layer of Colorbok Cafe' au Lait
~Three purple brads
~Layer of purple cardstock
~Sentiment stamped on vanilla cardstock
~Taylored Expressions Friendship Blooms leaf stamp
~Taylored Expressions Leafy Branch die cut
~Taylored Expressions Friendship Blooms flower stamp embossed with purple embossing powder and die cut using Taylored Expressions Friendship Blooms
~Three green brads
Challenges
Scrappy Frogs - kraft
Challenge Up Your Life - friendship
Crafty Ann's - floral frenzy
Frosted Designs - embossing
Paper Crafting Journey - embossing

Thank you for clicking by,
Nancy