Pine Cone Chandelier

Anyone who knows me knows that I am a more is more person..! My family is constantly telling me that less is more… Trust me it’s not more is more, and less is never more ha ha ha ha… Let me give you an insight into the world of me… I have writing/ sayings all over our house making it look more like a dictionary than decorations, I can’t eat just one cupcake, don’t ask about doughnuts and I won’t lie ha ha ha… and don’t even get me started on muslins for Mattea I think we have a mini fabric factory in her draw… But you get the point I’m a more is more kinda gal…The flip side to this is that clutter and myself coexist quite peacefully, much to the annoyance of my minimalistic husband.. How do we find balance i hear you ask, the kids and I have an art room/play room that he just closes the door and walks past, and so everyone is happy ?

I stood on our balcony one morning and took a deep breath to appreciate the arrival of spring and our garden in bloom. One would think this is enough just to sit back and enjoy nature, but not me of course I am looking at my garden thinking what can we add to the garden to give it that element of fabulousity… You know that little something something the birds would love coming home to and then it dawn on me after a night of Pinterest searching: a pine cone chandelier, can’t believe we didn’t have one before ?

You will need:

Water

Sunlight liquid
Paint (Dala liquid tempera plus clear varnish spray or Acrylic paint)
String
Pine Cones
Bowls for dipping

First the hunt: Gather different size pine cones, as many or as little as you like.. This all depends on how big a chandelier you want to create.. but rather more is more so you don’t run out mid way…And that’s it day one done…! Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither was our chandelier… The reality is I got to spend a good non rushed half hour (with how busy life is and in between ballet and school and mom and babes classes, breastfeeding, breathing, eating ha ha ha this is a big achievement for us).. Just a simple walk, talking with my kids while picking pine cone…

Second: Clean the pine cones

(4 days later I may add)

Wash the pine cones to clean it of any insects or dirt that could be inside the pine cone.. just plain dishwashing soap and warm water…Then leave them to dry throughly before you paint it…

The fun Part: paint, paint and more paint…

We used Dala liquid tempera paint again and it worked but if you expose it to water some of the paint may come off, so I would suggest using acrylic paint if you want longer lasting effect… I just sprayed a clear varnish over the tempera painted pine cones once they had dried to preserve the colour, although I must add that this made the colour go a shade darker…

I first attached the string to the pine cone.. Then use a deep bowl filled with paint to dip the pine cones in, once dipped turn the pine cone around so you get an even coverage of paint… we tried a shallow bowl but the pine cone doesn’t get coated enough, so rather use a deeper dish…then hang to dry… If there is excess paint on the pine cone spin it (while hanging)so some of the paint drips off..please note this gets very messy so be prepared, have a extra dish for them to wash up in or bath hee hee

Once the pine cones had dried throughly we moved them to our picnic tree and placed the pine cones around the tree..use different heights to create that chandelier effect..

And that’s it in a nut shell… One simple yet stylish pine cone chandelier…It took us two weeks in total as time is something rare these days with three, but remeber this it’s not how much time it took you to make it but rather the quality time you had making it…it gave me those precious stolen moments in the week with my girls where we just had fun and I remembered to just breathe…