Most of the Christmas decorations that I made over the holidays, including 12 1-inch and 6 1.25 inch cubes/presents/ornaments, 2 Relativity Boxes and various parts of a 120-piece Christmas Tree Box.
Santa’s workshop, aka my dining room table.
In December of 2022 I made various holiday themed boxes to give out to friends and family. I worked on three separate projects:
- Ornaments – I made 15 1-inch cubes and 6 1.25 inch cubes painted to look like little presents.
- Relativity Boxes – As part of a 3-part/5 box gift for my father, I made a 20-piece, wood stained Relativity Box, and a smaller 12-piece painted Relativity Box.
- Christmas Tree Box – I worked on what will be a 120-piece Christmas Tree Box, which should be finished before next Christmas.
Ornaments
Little presents that I made around the bottom 14 pieces of what will be a 120-piece Christmas Tree Box. Each present is made out of 6 wooden pieces, 2 of each of the 3 pieces shown at the bottom right.
A close up of two ornaments that I made, with the top piece removed.
In total, I made 15 1-inch and 6 1.25 inch cubes painted red, green, and white/gold with gold or silver fingers to look like little presents. The green presents have a smooth, metallic finish, the gold presents were painted white with a coat of golden glow glitter blast, while I hand painted the red presents with extra sparkly “Glitterific” acrylic paint. I then tied a string around the top piece so they can be used as ornaments. Finally, I included them in the following gift bags that I gave out to family, friends, and neighbors:
I made everything I put in these gifts bags except for the cookies.
Relativity Boxes
See: Relativity Box
A 12-piece Relativity Box painted the same 3 colors/finishes as the ornaments I made.
The gift included 2 assembled and 1 unassembled 1.25 inch cubes inside a 12-piece painted Relativity Box inside a 20-piece, 2-part wood stained Relativity Box.
I made this gift for my father in honor of childhood presents where I’d have to open multiple larger boxes to get at something small like a gift certificate.
The gift included five boxes that I made:
- A 20-piece, 2-part wood stained Relativity Box with 3.5 inch square sides.
- A 12-piece, single unit painted Relativity Box with 2-inch sides that I put inside of the 20-piece box.
- Three 1.25 inch cubes/presents/ornaments that I put inside the 12-piece box. The Relativity Box only fit 2 assembled cubes, with enough space for the unassembled 6 pieces of the 3rd cube.
Christmas Tree Box
See: Christmas Tree Box
60 of the 120 pieces of a 2-part Christmas Tree Box. Left: The assembled bottom part with 42 out of the 46 pieces. Right: The 12-piece lip that goes inside the bottom part so the top part fits over it. Top right: The 6 top pieces painted snow white, green and gold.
Left: a view of the 14-piece trunk of a Christmas Tree Box, stained dark walnut. Right: a view of the inside of the bottom part of a Christmas Tree Box.
This is the 2nd Christmas Tree Box that I am making after the one that I gave to my mother for Christmas 2021. I initially had hopes of finishing this by Christmas, but I ended up prioritizing the other 23 boxes I made and gave out as gifts. I also lost piece 45, which is one of the 4 missing from the bottom half of the box that I loosely assembled around New Year’s. Maybe it will turn up before I start working on it again around Thanksgiving.
Compared to last year’s Christmas Tree Box:
- I decided to use a single shade of green as opposed to last year’s 4 different shades.
- I used a matte finish instead of the gloss finish I used for 3 of the 4 shades of green last year.
- I also painted the top pieces white, but I painted the fingers different colors while last year’s white pieces had white fingers.
- I painted the fingers 8 different colors, using some metallic and glitter paint. Last year I only used 5 colors plus white to paint the fingers.
- Last year, all of the unpainted sides were unfinished wood: the 13-piece trunk, 12-piece lip, and the insides of the 96 painted pieces.
- This year I finished all the wooden sides. Most were stained golden oak with a semi-gloss polyurethane topcoat, while the trunk and outside of the lip were stained dark walnut.
- The bottom of the largest piece that sits on the trunk was painted green last year, and stained dark walnut this year to match the trunk.
Gallery
