Making a Costume Jewelry Christmas Tree

Well, here we are knocking on the door of another December, and thus another holly jolly holiday season.  So it's high time I share this project with you that I've been working on for some time now.  In truth, this little project is honestly YEARS in the making, though my contributions are much more recent.  May I present to you this costume jewelry Christmas tree made from my husband's grandmother's jewelry.    John has always lovingly referred to his grandmother as "Smith" and I have heard so many stories about good old Smith over the years I almost feel like I knew her myself.  She actually passed away shortly before I met John so I never had the pleasure, but working on this tree connected me in a very special way to her.  

Smith actually started this tree herself many many years ago.  John's parents saved it all this time and presented it to me along with a large bag of her jewelry several months ago, wondering if I might like to finish it.  So this is the "before" picture of the tree as I received it.  It was a large felted cone sitting atop a velvet covered box.  Several pieces of her jewelry already adorned it along with many many hand beaded straight pins and a mix of painted cockle burrs thrown in for good measure. 

This large pin that reads "Mother" was my favorite of the items that were already on the tree.  I actually ended up carefully removing all the jewelry, pins, and cockle burrs to begin with a clean slate, knowing that each of these pieces would find their own special spot on the tree once again as I started rebuilding it.   In fact, I'm pretty sure the "Mother" pin was the first thing I placed back on the tree when I started the reconstruction. 

Here you can see some of those cockle burrs, along with another favorite.  I loved the twisty turns of this watch swagged onto the tree. 

So once I removed everything from the tree, I wrapped it carefully in satin ribbon, pinning it to the tree all the way to the top.  I wanted to use all of Smith's original components, but the tree itself was very old, so the ribbon provided an extra layer of support for the tree as well as a pretty and clean backdrop to begin the process of adding the jewelry back on. 

I sorted all of her jewelry out before I started pinning to see what she had and make a little plan for myself.  She acutally had quite a few Christmas-y pieces like this Santa pin that I prominently displayed near the top.  If you look carefully to Santa's lower right side, you will also see a large gold  pin that reads "Lucille".  That was Smith's first name.  The pin near Santa's right hand bears the initials "DH".  The pin is actually from Deaconess Hospital, but since those are also my (maiden) initials, I worked it in close to the "Lucille" pin.  

I used a grouping of hat pins and stick pins to create the top of the tree.  See the initial "L" pin in the middle?  Another "L" for Lucille. 

I didn't have quite enough of Smith's jewelry to complete the tree, but thankfully John's parents also gave me a bunch of John's mom's old jewelry too.  So I supplemented with some of Jan's things here and there.  The signet pin you see her bears Jan's initials.  I love how this tree connects these generations.  It all started with Smith, sprinkled with some of her daughter's- Jan's- things, finished my me, and one day this pretty little tree will pass on to Lexi- who would have been Smith's great granddaughter. 

And here is the final product.  Just in time for Christmas!  Actually, I finished this tree back in October in time for what would have been Smith's 100th birthday this year.  

She stands nearly two feet tall with the base, but if you are hoping to recreate something similar, you could certainly make it to whatever scale works for you.  Cones in all sizes are available at your local craft store.  And this was actually very very easy to complete. I just used straight pins to attach the jewelry to the tree, so nothing is permanently attached and the pieces are all still intact.  

I'm so pleased with how she turned out.  And honestly, I don't think I will take her down after Christmas.  She is a beauty, made with love, and we will celebrate that year-round.