There are some projects I have had on my “want to make” list for a few years now. I have seen different themed ornaments made with small pieces of 2X2. (Not 1X2 as I had in the title). Some of the characters I have seen made were Santa, reindeer, elves, snowmen and even nativity pieces.
When we were living in Fort McMurray, one of our neighbours dismantled his deck. He graciously offered us all the deck boards, stairs and 2X2 railing. The railing had gone all around the deck so we ended up with many 2X2’s. Last year the pieces of wood were still in Fort Mac and I was in Grande Prairie so I couldn’t make any ornaments. Even now, with half of our house moved, most of the 2X2’s are still not here. Luckily, I remembered to bring a few with me the last time we visited our house there.
I probably could have just cut the wood and painted over top of the grey but I decided to send the wood through the drum sander first. Here are a few of the cut pieces after being cleaned off.
The pieces I used for this project were 5 inches long. My husband had used some of the 2X2’s for one of his projects and these pieces, all the same length, were his left over scrap.
I put two coats of acrylic white paint on the wood.
I have some Christmas fabric strips left over from when I made my burlap string garland. I thought they would make a great scarf for my first 2X2 ornament…a snowman. The strip had to be 10-11” long to fit nicely around. I doubled over and glued the piece to make a narrower scarf on a couple of my snowmen giving it some rigidity.
I had to make sure I had enough of the matching fabric to make a decent sized hat. I cut out a rectangle 7”x 6”; wide enough to wrap around the wood and tall enough to have the hat stand up but not droop over.
After making the first three snowmen using Christmas material I decided to make one more using plaid material. This also gave me the opportunity to take more photos of the process.
I have a number of different plaid materials, most of them old pajama bottoms. This particular plaid fabric is the same material I used for the scrap fabric star.
Glue on the hat first, mostly to make sure it covers any holes or imperfections in the wood. Decide which side of the wood will have the face and start gluing the hat on the opposite side. After gluing the hat on, bunch the top and tie it with a burlap string. The string should be long enough to create a loop for hanging. Cut off 1.5” of material off the top. Depending how far down you bring your hat, the amount you cut off will vary. Glue the hat together just at the top in the back.
For the scarf, find the middle of your fabric strip and glue it in the back. Glue the scarf slightly angled downward on the sides. Cross the ends over each other and glue down in front. Trim the ends to the length you prefer.
The last thing to do is paint on the face. Use two different sized paint brush handles dipped in paint for the dots for the mouth and buttons. Using the brush end of a detail brush, paint on the eyes, eyebrows and nose.
Here are the four different snowmen I made.
These will be the ornaments I give to my children this year. We’ll keep the blue plaid one for ourselves. I like the size of these as you can use them on a tree or just a standing decoration. The first of many 2X2 ornaments that I plan to make.
⛄️.