I recently joined my partner’s family for their annual Christmas Reunion and White Elephant gift exchange. The invitation said handmade gifts were welcomed, so I thought I would do a painting. I recently discovered a Goodwill that had lots of frames 5×7 or smaller for around a $1. I grabbed quite a few and had one that I wanted to use for this gift. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to do something that screamed Christmas, but definitely something wintry. I found a cute picture of blue birds in a bath and came up with this idea.
I originally painted this on a larger piece of paper and trimmed it down to fit the frame. I highly recommend you size out your frame prior to painting or setting dimensions. It is easiest if you just buy that size of paper, but my supplies are limited so I make do. After I was satisfied with the painting, I trimmed it out and placed it into the frame.
I have really been enjoying packaging my Patron’s monthly paintings and decided to do something similar for this gift. I have some music sheets that I also picked up at a thrift store ages ago. I took two pages and trimmed off a little of the excess around the borders. I taped the shorter edges together to create one long piece of music that wrapped around the frame securely. I wrapped the frame in some tissue paper, some paper ribbon and added a handmade card as well.
