To Flock Or Not To Flock?

If you don’t know by now that I’m Jewish, you’re probably new to LCH and that’s ok What it all boils down to is that sometimes I am very late to the Christmas party. I have recently “discovered” this phenomenon of elves on shelves, that apparently Santa handles presents differently depending on the family (sometimes he wraps, and sometimes he doesn’t?), and that you can put fake snow on a tree and call it flocked. So this is me getting on the flock wagon.

From what I understand you can buy a real tree already flocked, but what’s the fun in that? So when my friend Amy sent me this link, I knew I had to try my hand at a snow-kissed tree this year. It was surprisingly easy to execute,  and I may just be hooked.

I really wanted the effect to be realistic, so I focused on apply the “flock” to the tops of the branches only-like a true snowfall- and applied more to the outer most branches (that would generally catch more snow). I ended up modifying the recipe a bit because I couldn’t find all the ingredients:

• 2 cups grated Ivory soap (about 1.5-2 bars)
• 2/3 cup Bounce Ironing Spray (I couldn’t find plain liquid starch)
• 4 tbsp hot water

I blended everything together with my electric beater and applied it to the branches using both a small paintbrush and my fingers. Super easy. I think it would be fun to do with kids!

I love the flocked look, and my tree was all but done before I had a major impulse buy at the fabric store. Oh yes, I came home with 1 yard of plaid fabric to replace the seersucker on my chicken wire tree wrap. I plead insanity. I just couldn’t control myself. One cut across the length, a seam, and more duct tape gave me this final look:

Here are some other tree shots:

I wish I was a better photographer so I could capture how pretty the tree is! Maybe by next year