Alligator for Thanksgiving.

Alright, here's the deal.  This is a tutorial in two parts.  It still qualifies as easy.  BUT, the first part of the tutorial can be just a tiny but time consuming.  Let me 'splain.  No, there is too much.  Let me sum up.

Last year, you may remember that I printed the word "thanks" in many languages onto book pages.  I then traced around different leaf shapes and hand cut out a bazillion leaves to be used in numerous different ways.  Garlands, for instance.  And a wreath.  SO.  If you follow my leaf tutorial, it might take you more than 5 minutes to whip this out.  However, you will only be making a few leaves to go on a few sticks, so that will significantly cut down on the time.  You know what else would cut down on the time?  A silhouette.  Just saying.

So, let us first talk about the thanks on sticks.  
You will need:
Book page leaves in different shapes with "thanks" printed in different languages and colors and fonts
Hot glue gun/glue
Skinny sticks
gold spray paint
cotton twine
small hole punch
large vase/jar thing

Firstly, I spray painted my sticks gold.  You can totally not tell in this picture, but it's the best I've got.

 Then, I punched a small hole in each leaf.  My initial intent was to tie the leaves to the branches.  However, this proved to be more time consuming than I wanted and was kind of frustrating.  SO.  String your cotton twine through the hole and tie it in either a knot or bow.  I did some of both.
Then, put a dab of hot glue on the back of each leaf and press it to the stick wherever you want it.  I made it random and sporadic.
All that's left to do is put them in a vase!

 So, let's talk about this vase for a minute.

This vase was one of my first purchases for the current house we live in.  I bought it at a thrift store for cheap.  It was shiny black glass.  And directly after I bought it, I hated it.  Fast forward then (which is actually rewind from now) to last Thanksgiving.
I decided to spray paint it brown.

This is not plain brown.  You could tell, couldn't you?  I primed it first with Krylon in white.  When I started spraying it brown, I noticed that though it was smooth in most areas, there were some spots that crinkled up and were rough.  At first I was totally ticked off, since there really wasn't a good way to get rid of the wrinkly areas... then I realized it looked a little like faux alligator skin.  And I'm super weird in that I really like the look of faux alligator skin (says my two alligator skin purses and one alligator skin clutch and one alligator skin wallet...)  So, I tried my darndest to duplicate my mistake.  And, surprisingly, it worked out fairly well.

Basically, I just overloaded small areas with spray paint (so the coat was much too thick) (but not so thick it just ran down in drips everywhere) AND held the can too close to the vase while I sprayed.  So if you ever wondered what would happen if you ignored the directions and held the can too close, sprayed too much and unevenly, and did the project when it was colder than 50 degrees, NOW YOU KNOW!

I decided to place the base of the vase (oh my gosh, that was not intentional, but I'm impressed with my rhyming abilities right now...) in the middle of a fall colored stick wreath I already had.  Totally made the whole thing.

And here it is in action, surrounded by yummy food!

Somehow my house got nominated for Thanksgiving dinner yet again (even though we did Thanksgiving AND Christmas at our house last year, how did that happen???) and I've discovered that I have somehow misplaced? Gotten rid of? Given away? Most of these handy decorations I made...

What is wrong with me???

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