Well, we finally made a garland with all the pretty leaves we dipped in wax, and by "we" I really mean "I"--I made a garland out of the leaves on Sunday when I wasn't feeling well enough to go to mass so I camped out on the couch and tried to do sitting still things while Chris took the boys with him and Margaret napped. It turned out better than I expected and really adds a little extra something to our unseasonally decorated house.
David and I really did dip the leaves together and it was so much less complicated than it sounded when I was looking up instructions. A lot of people said to use "an old pot" to melt the wax in but if you are anything like me, while your pots may be "old" they are still just "your pots" so you might not want to melt wax in any of them which, I'm pretty certain, would be obnoxious to get back out once you were done. I just melted our wax on a stove burner in a disposable pie pan which worked beautifully and then was just.....disposed of. I realized later that I should have saved the whole thing, hardened wax and all, so we could use it again to dip more leaves later but alas--my desire for clear countertops overcame my better sense and I just chucked it out. Luckily I have a cabinet full so the loss isn't exactly devastating.
To make your own wax dipped leaves you just need to collect some pretty leaves and bring them home to flatten under something heavy. Get some wax (I just used some white beeswax I found on Amazon--I'm pretty sure yellow would be fine too but Martha Stewart said bleached so I figured that she meant white) and melt some of it on low in a disposable pan on your stove--or use that "old pan" that you've been dying to clean hardened wax bits out of, I won't judge you. Then put some wax paper nearby and then, holding onto the stem carefully, dip the leaves into the wax and lay them on the wax paper to harden. So easy! Nature study and handicrafts in one easy step :)
Our fall foliage is even prettier now than it was when we first went collecting so I think we may go out and get more for a second round of leaf dipping. Maybe we'll hang them in front of the windows--or maybe we'll just leave them sitting around in giant neglected piles until we realize it's time to put up the Christmas decorations. It's hard to predict these things.
Also, don't mind the random over-the-fireplace-decorating we have going on over here. We originally put up the salvaged window to balance out the TV that was sitting in front of it, but when we moved the TV off of the mantle we just left it there because we realized that we have plaster walls here and they are so obnoxious to repair holes in that we didn't want to deal with taking it down. And by that I mean Chris didn't want to deal with taking it down. He just made a giant hole in Margaret's wall last week though, so maybe the time has finally come to buy the repair supplies and figure out what to do with that spot. Lower the salvage window, just take the whole thing out, finally actually hang up the mirror? Give up in a fit of indecisiveness and wait until next year? It's hard to predict these things too.
