A Tree Grows...

I started this post a LONG time ago...and then got busy and in writing a new post, I realized I never finished this one...so here it is. 

We had a fundraiser for my daughter's school recently.  It was the pretty standard dinner dance with raffle baskets.  This year however I wanted to introduce a new element we called the "treat tree."  The basic concept is that you buy an ornament off the tree ($10.00).  Each ornament has a number on it and that number corresponded to a gift.  So you buy your ornament and then get a gift.  The best part is that each "gift" is worth $10.00 or more, so everyone is a winner.  It was a huge hit and because we really pushed we had 100 ornaments and sold them all- I am so happy!

I used branches that I put into a planter.  I used spray foam to hold it all in place... I didn't realize how much it would grow and grow and grow... it literally grew for three days!  Next time I would use less and wait it out...I put this together the day before and it grew a little too much! 

To help it stay upright until it was hard, I tied the branches to my fence. 

After it was all done, I spray painted the foam black and then added some tissue paper at the bottom.    I forgot to take a close up of the ornaments, but I used two different scallop punches and Tiffany blue ribbon to make them- they looked so pretty all hanging on the tree.

Sorry this is blurry...but here is the final tree at the event.  Behind the tree are all the gift bags that were numbered and corresponded to the various numbers on the tree.  It was so much fun watching people picking numbers and opening their gift!