~ A Honey Basket ~ creating with burlap and recycled tissue tubes

I have a tutorial to share today. Be forewarned, it's a pretty lame one.

Ok, let's make this! ^ ^ ^ look above ^ ^ ^


Behold, the humble inner-tube of a roll of toilet paper!

You probably don't use such huge bales of paper (with such wide inner-tubes) in your own home, but if you ever see an empty roll at some public restroom, you can save it..... I know it sounds kind of gross, but that's your problem, see... I got mine from a really, really sanitary place (that I actually help to clean sometimes, so it's REALLY clean, I'm sure of it).....

didn't mean to get so hung up on restrooms. let's move on ok?

- Cut you some nice, fuzzy burlap. (shall we have a burlap spree one day, all of us together?) Cut it into a nice, large circle much bigger than the base of your empty roll.



- Lay the burlap under the center of the roll and start wrapping up the sides, folding the fabric so it won't "stick out" the sides..... hard to explain, but I hope you get the picture. Tuck the overlap over the top edge of the roll into the insides.....


- Secure the fabric to the inner walls of the roll with adhesive. You could try glue-dots, or some other kind. I used liquid adhesive, which is --- um, really messy (sometimes i forget to use my brains).

- Sit at craft table and hold the burlap down tightly until the glue dries (approximately 30-40 minutes, if I remember rightly)


- Snack on favorite raspberry-chocolate cookie-bar while waiting for glue to dry... (as you can see I cheated and let go in order to hold the cookie... lesson learnt: glue-y fingers + cookie-bar = not good)


 - Admire nicely adhered burlap-to-roll.....


 (insert spectator-brother's question: "how do you take your pics with that colossal junk in the background?!")

- Wrap twine firmly around the burlap sides, to keep everything in place.....

... then change mind, unwrap, and wrap again..........


 - Add pretty lace trim to the base of the burlap sides. Adhere with more liquid glue... sit and hold for another 30 minute session....


- Untie twine bow, but don't unwrap.... fold twill bow like so ^ ^ ^ and tie twine around it (that is really mean of me to just say it that way, but how else could I?)

 
- Layer two pink mulberry-hydrangeas and add a gold-edged rose (I'm thinking the rose came from some dinky store I frequent ... but I can't be sure)... adhere to the center of the twill bow.


- Add a Melissa Frances resin embellishment just under the floral centerpiece.....

- Remove colossal junk from background and take some pretty pictures to share.....




My "honey-basket"... because I love it so much :o) ............. from rags to riches.


So that's my lame tutorial for you. I don't do this much because it's hard to balance the big camera in one hand and hold the "thing" with the other. Hope you'll have fun trying it out yourself (if you can find yourself a roll).

I'll be back, soon enough......
xoxo,
~Vi