The perfect gift for Christmas - the DIY...frame

I have always believed that the best Christmas present is the one you personally get involved in. I don't think Christmas is about how much I can spend or how big a present I give, but about how much "of me" I can give. And I don't think I have to make much of a sacrifice for that. I just have to try to do something with my hands, to give a slice of my time.

Last years I managed to make knitted or sewn things. I think I had a bit more time. 🙂 This year I have less time, but I still don't want to give up the tradition. And I've been thinking of making some simple photo frames or converting some older ones. I found some really good ideas and I want to share them with you. There is still some time until Christmas, the ideas are not hard to realize, so you wouldn't have too many excuses not to try.

The easiest way to make a frame is to start with a simple piece of wood. It can even be an old piece of wood, left exactly as it was found, basically a piece of reclaimed wood. Wrap a few coils of string around it, tightly, so that a photo sits between the coils of string and the wood. Decorate it with a flower, also made of string or burlap, and the frame is ready.

The piece of wood can be cut into a square or rectangle, painted with a paintbrush in whatever color you have at home and sanded a little after drying to give it an aged look. Repeat the process with the string and decorate with a large sackcloth bow. The resulting frame could even make a perfect Christmas present.

If you have old unused frames, with very little effort you can bring them back to life and turn them into a very nice Christmas present. You can decorate them with string from place to place by simply wrapping the string around the frame.

Or you can put on the back of the frame some pegs (or small nails) to hang 2-3 rows of string. Attach 2-3 small clothes pegs to them and use them to hold the photos.

If the old frame doesn't look so good, don't worry, it can still be used. With a few twigs collected from the park, you can make a great frame.

If you don't want to collect twigs, you can buy pebbles for decorating garden paths in DIY stores. They come in smaller bags and in different colors and sizes. Pebbles can be glued to the frame with SuperGlue.

I have a habit of collecting wine corks in a bowl. Over the years I've collected quite a lot and being a hoarder, I didn't really feel like throwing them away. Now I've found a great idea to use them. I can glue them on an old picture frame to give to a wine connoisseur for Christmas. I think he'll enjoy it.

Finally, an idea for a shabby chic frame. You can start with a simple frame, colored in a dark color, something like walnut or burgundy.

Brush on a coat of white color and let dry.

Then apply another coat, a darker, but pastel color (gray, beige, grayish pink). You can get the color by starting with white and adding a few drops of black, red, blue, or whatever else you have around the house.

After drying, sand with an abrasive sponge in such a way that in some places you get down to the first layer, in others to the white layer. Do this without following a particular pattern. There are no rules, do as you feel, as you think it will come out best. You will get a frame worthy of a Christmas present.

I hope you find the above ideas useful. And I want to let you know that as soon as I finish here, I'm going straight to the attic where I know I have some older frames. Abea waiting to get to work. Good luck to you!