Sea Shell Decoupaged Shell Ornaments
This is an idea I borrowed and tweaked from a local artist who makes and sells beautiful decoupaged jewelry dishes.
My shells are slightly different, edged with gilding wax, and made into beautiful coastal Christmas ornaments.
This project began with a walk on the beach one beautiful fall day.
I collected a bunch of oyster and clam shells from our local beach.
I love collecting and up-cycling things I find on the beach.
I brought the shells home and scrubbed them with a bleach cleaner.
I let the shells dry on a towel for several hours.
Next, I used Mod Podge to decoupage a single layer of a decorative napkin to the inside of the shell.
I coated the top of the napkin with another coat of Mod Podge.
You can use either matte, satin or gloss Mod Podge, I used matte.
Once the shells were dry, I used my electric sander to sand the edges of the shells to remove sharp edges.
The shells are easy to sand using sandpaper too.
The sanding not only smoothed the edges, it also trimmed the napkin to fit the shell perfectly.
Next, I used gold gilding wax to rub all over the edges of the shells.
The gold wax hid any rough edges of the napkin and gave the shells a finished look.
I also rubbed the back of the shells with the wax which enhanced the beautiful texture of the shells.
On one of the largest shells I stenciled the word Joy with white craft paint.
Lastly, I drilled a small hole in the top of the shell and tied a length of waxed twine through the hole.
On the twine I tied a bow.
These beautiful shells found their way from the beach to my Christmas tree in a few easy steps.
They make great gift tags or hostess gifts and can be personalized with any kind of decorative napkin you can find for any occasion.
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