Isnt it fun decorating your garden with bird baths, stepping stones and other accessories? Shopping at garden stores is an expensive way to add garden accents, and even though theyre beautiful, you can make a unique set of garden birds that will look great in your garden, but cost you little. Do you have a couple of wicker baskets? Then you probably have everything you need to create the cute creatures.
Grapevine baskets work really well for this project, but you can use many different types of baskets, as long as they dont have a handle. Use different sizes to create small and larger birds. If the basket you want to use isnt the right color just spray paint it before starting the project. Youll need one basket for each bird you make. Youll also need some pliable wire, like florist wire, to attach the craft supplies to the baskets.
Large plastic flowers are perfect for the birds eyes. Dont spend big bucks on beautiful silk flowers; the cheap, plastic kind work better. Obviously, youll need much larger fake flowers for the eyes of big birds and smaller flowers for the eyes of smaller birds. Cut the stem from the flowers to begin creating the eyes. Leave a short part of the stem so that you can later wrap a wire around it. Glue a set of wiggly eyes into the center of two matching flowers. Make sure the adhesive you use will not break down in water. Wrap a wire around the bottom of each flower. Wrap the wire several times then push it through the bottom of the basket. The flat part of the basket will become the birds face. Decide where the eyes will go and use the wire to attach. After wrapping the wire around the flower, and pushing it through the basket, bend it to secure. Now youll make a beak for the bird. Take a piece of craft foam and cut out something of a kite shape. The longer end of the kite will become the beak and the shorter end of the kite will attach to the birds face. Fold the kite shape over a long piece of wire. Staple the beak to hold the wire inside. The wire will be more secure if you first twist the end before trapping it inside the foam. Push the wire through until the beak touches the basket. Twist the wire to secure. Use two dowels to make the legs of the bird. Use long dowels to make a tall bird and much shorter, skinnier dowels to make short birds. Align the dowels on the backside of the bird, which is the rim of the basket. Use wire, and weave it around the dowels and through the basket, until it is tight. Cut two bird feet shapes from foam and cut a hole towards the back. The hole should be large to slide in the dowels. When youre ready to put the birds in the ground simply place the two feet on the ground, slide in the dowels, and thats it. The foam feet wont be attached except by the insertion of the dowels. If you want, though, you can wrap a piece of tape around the dowel, above the foot, to keep the foot from scooting up when the wind blows. Instead of using dowels for legs you can cut the feet shapes, staple them to the basket, then use a garden stake to hold the bird in place. Hang the basket, by the rim, on the stake. Use a wire to wrap around the stake and through the basket. This will keep the basket from blowing off of the garden stake. Another way to create the legs is to use a forked stick. Omit the foam bird feet and just attach the sticks to the basket with wire. Make a single bird or a family of birds. Make all the birds look the same or use different colors of fake flowers and foam to create a new look for each bird. Combine little eyes with a big beak, or large eyes with a large beak, to make all different sorts of birds. Make owls, toucans, turkeys and more. Theyre all really easy when you start with a simple basket!
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