Hello everyone, Heather Leopard is here on the blog today kicking off Patriotic colors week.  In honor of the upcoming Memorial holiday in the States where we honor the fallen from our armed forces, I created a patriotic home decor piece.  This can be used for anything Patriotic themed of course, but we are displaying it this coming weekend in memory of those who aren’t coming home.

America…land of the free, because of the brave!

So I found this awesome wooden cut out in the shape of the United States at my favorite dollar spot last year.  While I’ve used it in the past as part of the decor, kind of kept plain and in the background, it was time for this baby to take center stage! All it needed was a little imagination and creativity.

I will have a process video for this coming within a few days but until then, I’ll walk you through my process…

I started out with the idea to add a statement or phrase to the board but it’s a little bit on the small to medium size and more on the small size so I trimmed it down to one word. I considered “home”, “U.S.A.” and a few others but ultimately decided to state the obvious and go with “America”. I wrote out the word in my die cut machine software and sized it to 2″ h x 8″ w and cut it out of patterned paper.  I knew I wanted to re-use the board, so I adhered it with a temporary tape runner adhesive.

Next, I cut a selection of 3D flowers.  Some are layers upon each other like the red one assembled above and the red and blue trio of petals above that are patiently waiting to be assembled.  The others  are quilled paper flowers in various sizes.

These fun super dimensional flowers start off looking like a spiral.  I used a quilling tool to easily roll them up. You could also use a pencil or pen to roll your flowers. You simply insert the “tail” of the spiral into the slit in the metal part of the tool or wrap it around and pencil and start rolling it up.

I wrap mine tight for the most part and then pull the tool or pencil out and release the flow, letting it unravel a bit.  I used liquid adhesive but to speed up the drying process, you may want to use a glue gun. The glue gun also helps ensure the flower stays in place better than the liquid adhesive.  Knowing I wanted to re-use the board, I applied a small amount of glue dots behind each flower to adhere them to the board. Did you notice that I used one of the small ones as the dot for the “i”?

I wanted to add additional elements to it, similar to how I would a scrapbooking layout so I went into my stash and pulled out some stars I had leftover from another project and tucked them into the flowers.  I had to lift a few and re-stick them here and there but I was able to use the same glue dots so it was easy peasy.  I also added some puffy dots around the board.

So there you have it, a fun and easy piece of home decor that I plan to use this week and next to commemorate Memorial Day and celebrate the 4th of July.

Thanks so much for stopping by today.

xoxo, Heather
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Supplies:
Land That I Love Land That I Love Patterned Paper
Land That I Love Boom Sparkle Pop Patterned Paper
Land That I Love America Patterned Paper
Land That I Love Oh! The Place We Go! Patterned Paper
Land That I Love Fireworks Patterned Paper
Land That I Love United We Stand Patterned Paper
Land That I Love Patriotic Blooms Patterned Paper
Land That I Love Red, White, and Blue Dots Puffy Stickers