Holiday Decorating: Domed Christmas Tree Displays

Back in November, I found some small glass domes at a local Goodwill. I wanted to use them to cover a tiny truck or car hauling a Christmas tree. It took some hunting around for the exact size and look of vehicle I'd envisioned, but I finally found what I needed to complete this project...and in time for Christmas!

Now I'll confess that as a child, we never strapped a Christmas tree to the top of a vehicle. I can only remember having a real tree on a couple of occasions, and those trees were cut from our front yard when they grew too big for the space where they'd been planted. Most of the time we had an artificial tree. Maybe that's why I'm so captivated by little vignettes like this -- I'm trying to re-create a childhood I never had! (OK, that's a bleak thought for a Tuesday morning. Let's move on! LOL)

The domes are only about 3" wide so I had to find a toy truck/car that would fit. I quickly discovered that most toy trucks are too modern-looking for this type of project. A monster truck was not the look I was going for, nor did I want to pay for a true collector-type old toy vehicle! Finally I found a suitable truck and car at our local Fleet Farm store.

Still, they looked a bit too shiny and needed to be roughed up for the proper vintage look. One day I stumbled up a small bottle of Antiquing Medium at Hobby Lobby and decided to give it a try.

I sanded the vehicles and wiped them down with this thick, brown liquid.

The scuff marks picked up the liquid and created an antiqued look. I was very happy with the results!

 

The other challenge was finding some decent-looking trees in the proper size to fit under the dome. I found these trees at Fleet Farm in the area with small village houses. They also needed to be roughed up a bit, and I didn't care for the wire "trunks" showing at the bottom.

I wrapped the trunks with thin natural twine and glued it in place, then I rubbed the trees with brown Distress Ink. That seemed to do the trick.

Finally, I wrapped twine around the trees, strapping them to the tops of the vehicles. The tree in the truck had to go in at an angle because I didn't have room under the dome for it to extend out in back!

I put both vehicles on top of small wood blocks (found at Hobby Lobby) for a little bit more height and to carry out that "we-just-came-from-the-Christmas-tree-farm" look.

The finishing touch was to add a bit of "snow" around the vehicles.

The vehicles fit perfectly (just barely!) under the domes! WHEW!

It was fun to put these little treasures out for Christmas. They are small enough to sit on top of a stack of books without taking up too much space.

I really enjoyed making these little displays! It was a bit of a challenge finding the right pieces to fit under these small domes, but in the end I was happy with how they turned out. I'll look forward to putting them out again next holiday season!

jp