Twig Luminary Tutorial

I love being surrounded by woodsy, nature inspired crafts, especially in the winter time when the mountains are full of snow and hiking is on the back burner for a short while. I found these twig candle holders on Pinterest and pinned them for a "someday" project. I saw that my friend Lexi pinned them, too, and when the ice storm here brought down a plethora of branches, we got together as soon as we could to make them.

Source: webecoist.com via Rachel on Pinterest

I didn't read the tutorial until later so I didn't know that they used some kind of special adhesive for glass. Lexi and I used a glue gun and at first it the branches kept popping off, but once the glue got nice and hot, we didn't have any more issues.

I got some clear glass candle holders at the dollar store. I couldn't find any good round ones, so I got square instead, which I ended up liking a lot. 

The greenbelt behind her apartment had a ton of branches and we found some delightful red colored ones with clean bark (as opposed to the soggy, mossy ones that are so prevalent in these parts :P).

We dried them off and cut them down to the length we wanted. 

And then we started gluuuuuing!! I did mine in sections, putting the hot glue on the glass and then smooshed the branches...and my poor fingers, occasionally...into the glue.

I had some gaps between the branches...

Which I filled with smaller branches and then tied some raffiki..raffeta..rastafarria..crinkly plant tie stuff.

I always call it papery twine stuff. Whatevs.

I also found some tiny pinecones which I used on the other one I made. 

Here they are, all lit up! I love the branchy shadows they cast. 

There's something so magical about the power of hot glue. It's so wonderful for instant gratification type personalities such as myself! Lexi texted me later that night telling me that she was wandering around her house trying to find other things to hot glue. Seriously...I want to glue branches on everything now. Must gluuuuuue! 

Rachel

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