Falling for Plaster Leaves...

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Lately I’ve been obsessed with decor elements in white – just a little here and there. Being that it is now Fall, I wanted to do a craft project using white in my Fall tablescape. I went to Dollar Tree and purchased some silk leaves. I was pleasantly surprised at the decor selection that they had. I need to remember to shop here more. I purchased a bag of 20 Fall leaves for $1.00 – what a great deal. I was thinking that I could transform the leaves in some way to be white. I tried and failed at painting one leaf with white craft paint. The paint soaked into the silk and the color ran. Yuck…

I really wanted the leaves to have kind of a pottery or bisque texture to them. I then went to Hobby Lobby and found craft plaster. It is a white powder compound in containers that are 4 or 8 pounds. I purchased the 8 pound container and used a 40% off coupon.

I followed the directions on the back of the plaster container (the 2nd time) and mixed it in a container I found in the garage. I stirred the mixture very well until there weren’t any lumps.

DO NOT be tempted to do what I did on my first batch of plaster. I operate on a more-is-better system and thought it would be a great idea to double the recipe. That was an absolute failure. This plaster hardens very quickly and is impossible to use after several minutes. Your bucket will look like this…

I did this project at my kitchen table. I laid out vinyl table cloths to protect my table. I then covered the vinyl tablecloths with waxed paper to lay out the plaster-covered leaves for drying.

I used a paintbrush to spread the plaster onto the leaves. Again, I worked very quickly as the plaster sets fast.

I covered each leaf front and back. By drying the leaves on waxed paper it was very easy to peel them off with no cracking or damage to the plaster. The plaster was dry to the touch after about ten minutes. I didn’t move them for 2 hours to be sure that they were completely dry.