This is a project that I got in my email from Hewlett-Packard. It’s completely free to download and use…of course they expect you to use their printers, inks, and papers. But you don’t necessarily have to. It’s certainly easy and inexpensive to make this with the instructions as given, but you can improvise, should you not own a color printer, of just don’t want to use that much ink.
This centerpiece is called Tree of Gratitude, and you can find the instructions for this and related projects HERE. It is simple yet elegant, and you can probably find most of what you need already in your own home…or just outside of it, in the case of twigs and branches from nearby trees. Surely you have a vase or two sitting around, unused. If not, you might have a nice looking jar, bottle or glass. And you may well also have some sort of ribbon, and strings to tie the leaves onto the tree. Inprovise with what you hve before you go out and spend any money!
If you do not have a color printer, or the cost of the ink is prohibitve, here are some other ideas. If you are a paper crafter, and have a die-cutting machine and a leaf die/dies, just use that to cut out leaves from autumn-colored papers/cardstocks that you may already have in your stash.
If you can print with black ink, I found a site that has an assortment of leaf templates. It’s right HERE. You can either print the leaves onto colored paper/cardstock, or on plain white and color them in yourself. If you have kids, they might enjoy doing some of the coloring, as well. Or print them out and cut out, trace onto colored/patterned papers of your choice, cut out.
If the leaves that fall outside aren’t too crinkly yet, you can gather up some nice ones and use real leaves on your tree. You probably won’t be able to write on them, though, so make some paper ones if you and your family/guests want to write stuff you are thankful for on them, and hang on the tree.
If you are a stamper, you might well have a rubber stamp or two (or more) of leaves. Stamp,. cut out, color, and use.
Let the original project instructions simply be a guide…and improvise with what you have to make a pretty centerpiece for your Toikey Day table!
