Free People Blog

I have a special two-part DIY for you today! I started out wanting to make little charm bracelets inspired by one I saw on the wrist of a co-worker:

And then, I thought that these would make great little add-ons to holiday gifts! Say you’re going to a holiday party and bringing a bottle of wine or champagne for your friend – tie a little personalized charm bracelet around the neck to make it more special! And that got me thinking about gift toppers…

I’m one of those people who is terminally gift-wrap-challenged. No matter how hard I try, you can always tell which gifts are from me because the wrapping paper is wrinkled, sometimes torn, and all-around disheveled.  This year I decided maybe I’m taking the wrong approach. I love the idea of using plain brown recycled paper to wrap a present, and then dressing it up with cute little toppers. I am happy to say it totally worked – the toppers look really sweet and natural with the brown paper, and kinda detract from the poor wrapping job.

But first, the charm bracelets:

What you need: for the charm bracelets I used silk thread, charms and beads, all from AC Moore.

I love the simplicity of just one charm on the bracelet, and the pretty colors of the thread. I simply added a bead to each side of the charm, with knots on either side. Once I was finished with the DIY, they made nice little holiday gifts for my co-workers :)

Now for the gift toppers:

I used the above items (not really sure what you’d call them?), both of which can be found at AC Moore. I especially love the branches on the left, and they actually smell really nice too. I also used a couple of twigs that I picked up outside :)

I loved the idea of using natural elements like this, and I also picked up some little fake creatures to go with it:

Lastly, in true FP style, I wanted to incorporate little touches of pink, so I used the following supplies from my crafting drawer and our display workroom.

Neon acrylic paint, paintbrush, pink duct tape and pink embroidery floss.

Here are the results!

To make the twig look decorative I wrapped it in pink embroidery floss!

It also makes a perfect perch for the little bird:

Attaching a fake (or real!) flower to the twig also makes it festive – and I love using the hay as ribbon to tie it down to the gift!

For this one I painted random leaves of the branch neon red. This would look awesome on a pine cone too.

Lastly, the charm bracelets also make great gift toppers! Such a nice way to personalize a gift even more :)

Happy Holidays!

xo

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