Christmas Decoupage Made Easy

Make Lovely Christmas Gifts And Decorations Using Easy Napkin Decoupage Techniques

Decoupage can be a quick, easy and inexpensive way to transform plain blank objects into special gifts and decorations which will be treasured for years to come. The following technique can be used on many different surfaces, such as papier mache, MDF, wood, candles, terracotta flower pots, ceramics, photo and scrapbooking albums.

Choose some Christmas table napkins with designs which will be easy to cut out and will fit in with your theme. There will be many suitable designs such as angels, trees, holly, Father Christmas and so on. The advantages of using napkins for decoupage are their low cost, the many designs available, you don't have to find a craft shop for them, and because they are thin, they are very flexible and so ideal for curved surfaces. The resulting finish will be very smooth.

Prepare the surface of the item you want to decoupage. Usually this means painting the surface with an acrylic paint. Some surfaces may need to be primed first  - terracotta, for example, soaks the paint in so you may want to paint with an undercoat first to give a better finish. Painting the inside of a flower pot with dilute PVA glue will stop water soaking through and ruining the decoupage.
Allow to dry.
Sponge with a complimentary colour or highlight certain areas with metallic paint. Rubbing the edge of the rim of a terracotta pot or the edge of a tray with gold paint gives a festive opulent effect
Allow to dry
Coat all the surface with a decoupage finish such as Mod Podge by Plaid or Royal Coat Decoupage, also by Plaid. ( you could also experiment with different dilutions of PVA glue - but test first!)
While this is drying, cut out tthe designs from the napkins and separate the plys to leave just the layer with the design
Using one piece at a time, position the design onto the prepared surface. Take an iron (a small travel iron is ideal), protect the surface of the iron with greaseproof paper (I think this is called freezer paper in the USA) and carefully iron the napkin piece in place. Repeat for all the design pieces and allow to cool.
If any design pieces are going to overlap, coat the whole project surface with decoupage finish before ironing the next piece on. Building up thin layers of decoupage finish will give extra durability to the finished project.
Paint with a final layer of decoupage finish or varnish
If you would prefer a crackled antique look, use a dark colour for the base coat. Dry, then apply crackle medium (available at most craft shops) all over. Allow to dry again,then apply a light colour with a brush loaded with the paint. Use a swirling brush stroke and be careful not to cover the same area twice . Let the crackled surface dry for at leasr 24 hours before decoupaging -ironing can lift the crackle medium and paint if it has not been allowed to dry thoroughly.

On a larger scale, I have also decoupaged a large terracotta pot to hold our Christmas tree. For this, you need large napkin designs to keep the proportions looking right.

I hope these instructions on how to make a Christmas decoupage gift or decoration have given you a few ideas. Try it out - you probably already have most of the materials around the house.