Whether or not the leaves change where you live, you’ll fall for these projects!
Embellish Leaves
Try applying paint or glitter directly to leaves. You can use leaves that are green or autumnal, real or silk, dried or pressed – you can even print your own!
1. Gold-Painted Leaves: Gold paint against richly-colored fall leaves is just gorgeous! A single painted leaf or small grouping of them in a simple frame would be lovely.
2. Hojas Pintadas / Drawn-on Leaves and Wreath: You could also go with an earthier palette and use ultra fine tip sharpies or paint pens where you wanted more detail. Once you have a stack of patterned leaves, you can gather them into a fall wreath.
3. DIY Falling Leaves Garland: All you need is some glue and glitter to make your leaves sparkle! Then hang them from a ribbon to create a garland, sprinkle them across a table, or display them in a glass jar. If you wanted to use real leaves instead of silk ones in your garland, you might want to skip punching a hole in favor of tying the ribbon around the leaf stems or attaching with clothespins or hot glue.
Leaves for Embellishing
Use real leaves (any color) to stamp, shape, or decorate.
4. Stamped Leaf Mandala Journal Page: Use leaves as stamps for your journal pages to remind you of the local flora. Stamped leaves in different colors can form the basis of a pattern like this mandala.
5. Leaf-Imprinted Clay Necklace: Press a small leaf into clay to make a one-of-kind pendant.
6. Sand-Cast Birdbath in a Leaf Shape: This is the most involved project on the list, but the step-by-step instructions make it look totally doable. A large leaf becomes the form for a concrete birdbath. You could also skip the pedestal-making steps and create an oversized leaf-shaped bowl, which would be a fantastic base for a fall centerpiece.
7. Foliage Pumpkins: Decopauge ferns or fall foliage on white pumpkins for an alternative to the traditional orange jack-o-latern. (original project, left photo)
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Photos via respective sites.
