How To: Valentine Heart 'Tree'

This morning I shared with you my Valentine's Day Mantel and mentioned two tutorials that would be coming.  Here's the first tutorial on how to make those little heart 'trees' you saw.  Normally I don't post twice in one day, but I wanted to post this before the weekend, so that if you're heading out to shop for some crafting supplies, and would like to make one of these, you'll have the tutorial.  It's not difficult at all, and you may already have most of the supplies somewhere in your house.

Supplies:

- Felt squares {you can find these at most craft stores or fabric stores, usually for about $.39 a piece}

-Scissors

-Heart shaped stencil

-Hot glue gun and glue sticks

-Twigs

-Vase

-Epsom Salt {or other vase filler}

1. Use your heart stencil to trace hearts onto the felt.  You can use a pen or marker, whatever will write on the felt, because you won't see the inked side once finished.  Cut out the hearts.

Please ignore my awful looking thumb nail!  {now that I'm drawing extra attention to it!}

2. Gather your twigs {mine happened to be leftover greenery branches from Christmas that I had intended to make a wreath with and never did it!} and determine how many you want to use per tree.  Also determine how many hearts you want per twig.

3. Fill vase with epsom salt and place twigs inside.  The salt will keep the twigs from moving around.  Another great filler would be Valentine colored M&M's, but I knew I'd be too tempted to eat them {Plus, we're using candy as a potty training bribe right now, and I didn't want my 2 year old climbing up to grab candy from my mantel decor for her success on the potty}.

4. Place a thin line of glue down the middle of the backside of the felt heart.  

5. Stick onto the twig, pressing gently to adhere.

6.  Repeat with remaining hearts and twigs.

And, here is the entire mantel:

No one will see my 'trees' from the back, but if you wanted to make this for a centerpiece or other spot where the backs would be visible, simply make double the hearts and place another felt heart on the other side, sandwiching the twig between two hearts.

Linking to: