Martha Monday--Oooo, sparkly!

Inspired by Pinterest, I decided to get my holiday craft on with Martha Stewart's glitter and some old Christmas light bulbs to make a fun, festive, and frugal centerpiece.

I bought the glitter (on clearance!) and the glittering glue (with a coupon!) at Michael's. I'd never really glittered anything, save for grade school art projects, so I bought the smallest bottles of glitter in case the whole thing turned out to be a big, sparkly disaster. I will say this to the good people at MS Crafts: Glitter is intimidating!  Put some directions on these things!

Fortunately, I got an astonishing number of those huge Christmas light bulbs from a coworker for free.  Most were dead by the time I received them so they were perfect for the project. 

The glittering glue comes with a brush inside the container. I simply brushed a coat of the glue on...

And then covered the thing with glitter.  I did this over sheets of waxed paper so when I was done with a color I could pour the excess glitter back into the jar. Less waste!

Not that I have a lot of experience with glitter, but I have to say the texture and colors of MS Craft glitter is amazing.  I doubt my pictures do it justice, but trust me when I say these colors are incredible!

I made 12 bulbs with each color, and that only took up half the jar.  My estimate is that you could do 22-24 large bulbs with one small vial of glitter.  A little bit goes a long way.

Once the bulbs were glittered, I began preparing the vessel. The outer vase is from Wal-Mart and cost less than $5.00. The tall glass candle in the middle is from The Dollar Tree. 

I waited a few hours for the glue to dry before putting the bulbs in the vase. Once I started moving them around, I realized that I should have waited overnight to give the glue more time to dry.  Again: some directions on the products would have been handy here. 

Because of my haste, there is some smearing and smudges on some of the bulbs which is unnoticeable unless you are right on top of the display.  I had plenty of glittered bulbs for the main centerpiece, and I put the remaining bulbs on another glass tray with another white candle to complete the scene. The glittered bulb display is on the mantle now, but it will be on my dining room table in time for Christmas dinner. 

Overall this was a very simple and frugal centerpiece project.  I estimate the entire project cost under $17.00, and I still have plenty of glitter and glue left over to tackle another project.   Which is great, since a few more projects are needed to take me from glittering newbie to sparkling expert.  I hope.

Have you glittered anything lately? Or ever?  I'd love to hear about it!