Good Morning,

Welcome to Day #5 of the Little Blue House's

12 Days of Ornaments.

I had the pleasure of making this little beauty.

An Iris Fold layering technique

minus the folding part.

Here are the supplies I used:

4' round paper mache' ornament

5 coordinating paper, small prints work best

coordinating paint

Iris folding circle template:
(www.gomakesomething.com)

Tape runner

painters tape or scotch tape

1- 6x6 or larger acrylic sheet

paper trimmer

scissors

brown ink pad

hot glue gun

Tim Holtz small snowflake die

old button

twine
Stardust Stickles

First, paint your ornament in a color that coordonates with your chosen papers.
I used red as my background color. Set aside to dry.

Paper Strips:

Cut two 1/2"x12" strips of each paper.

Then cut strips into segments:

Two 2-1/2" lengths

and the rest into 2" lengths for each paper.

Decide which print and color will compliment its neighbor. (ex: if using more than one of the same color, you may want to place a lighter or contrasting color between the two to allow papers to reveal their own personality)

NOTE: To help me keep papers in the right order I sorted each print into piles marked A-E which coordinates with the labeling on the template.(See below)
Keep the side you want to display on your ornament facing up in the sort piles. When you start your layering they will get turned over to face the acrylic. More on that when we actually start layering. As tricky as this all sounds it will get easier to understand as you go, I promise.

Now the Iris folding technique is usually one that is

done on the back side of a card stock cutout allowing us to adhere layers securely,

later to be flipped over revealing the design of the card. For our

ornament we will not have the cutout to adhere our layers to,

so we will be using an acrylic sheet to aid us with this.

Place image side of template, face up, on the underside of your

acrylic sheet and secure with either the scotch tape or painters tape.

You will be working on the top side of the acrylic

with your printed papers.

Notice the template is numbered 1-40 with a letter following.

The number will keep you from skipping a spot, and the letter will indicate which paper lay down. The numbering is very helpful in keeping your pattern from looking like you skipped a spot. (And it is noticeable if a spot gets skipped)

Let's Layer:

Using the 2-1/2" piece from pile A, lay across template section

marked 1A with your desired print facing down, lining up

the paper segment with the straight line of the 1A section.

Repeat for segments 2-5. Securing each

piece to the acrylic with tape.

Run a length if permanent adhesive, using your tape runner, across

the backs of all 5 sections. Try not to get any adhesive on the acrylic.

Repeat for each segment.

Once you have the pattern rolling the smaller 2" lengths will be long

enough for the middle area. Continue layering until all 40 layers

are on leaving the middle open.

HINT: The nice thing about working on the acrylic is

that you can turn the acrylic up to make sure that your pattern is running the proper course. All segments get a line of adhesive so everything is secure.

Once the last segment is down, you can run more adhesive across the back of

layers for attaching to your painted ornament.

Carefully remove the completed pattern from acrylic sheet.

Trim off tape then center and secure to ornament.

Turn over ornament and clip paper tags.

Swipe a little brown ink to catch on the edges of the

papers and ornament corners.

To make the center decoration, I used the
NEW Tim Holtz snowflake die.

Cut, fold and adhere according to die instructions.

I added an old button with a twine bow to secured to

the center of the snowflake and then to the center of the

ornament using my hot glue gun.

A little Stardust Stickles on the sides, the back of the ornament
on and the edges of the snowflake for a little SpArkLe.
And now your Iris Fold inspired ornament
is ready for the tree.

Thank you for stopping by to check out my ornament.
Hop on over to the Little Blue House blog and
leave a comment for us. The LBH gals love to hear from you, and it
will get your name into the daily drawing for one of today's ornaments.

Merry Crafting!

Rhonda