Hot Cocoa Tray - Christmas Decor

Our tray started out as something to hold plants (above, minus the plants).

This roll of vinyl grasscloth wallpaper is going to go a long way in my craft stash and today it’s coming out to play again!

To start, I measure and cut a piece of the vinyl grasscloth to fit the tray.

The  Christmas Blend Hot Cocoa stencil from Old Sign Stencils is going to be a great tie-in for our Hot Chococate Station.

I centred the stencil vertically and horizontally. Because of the size of the tray, I don’t end up using the 5 lb bags wording at the bottom. Hold it down at the corners with painters tape.

Stencil Technique

You can complete this stencil in under minutes; it’s that fast!

I like to use plastic lids to hold my paint because I need so little of it. I find that once the paint dries, I can just peel it right off the plastic and reuse it again. The paint I’m using is PPG Break-through.

I’m using a #8 natural bristle stencil brush for the wording. Dip the tips into the black paint and offload most of it onto paper towels. It should be dry to the touch. Then swirl the paint on. Reload when necessary.

As you can see, even though the surface of the vinyl grasscloth is textured, there is no paint bleed. That’s why offloading most of the paint is so important. You’ll get clean, crisp lines – even if the surface isn’t perfectly smooth.

For the trees, I bump up the size of the stencil brush to #10 and am using green paint.

Last, but not least, I’m using a 1/2 stencil brush to complete the stars.

I only did one coat of black, but 2 coats of the green and yellow.

With the tray taken apart, take advantage of the opportunity to clean both sides of the glass with glass cleaner before reassembling. Reuse whatever backing came with the tray and put it back together in the reverse order.

Project #1 Complete!

Our new tray will be a permanent part of our hot chocolate station! It’s so nice to have a festive tray this season that will allow us to carry our hot chocolate from the kitchen to the family room.

It makes a lovely Christmas gift and it's so fast and easy to do!

There’s two more projects to come before our Hot Chocolate Station is fully complete. The cups may be empty now, but that doesn’t mean we won’t enjoy a cup or two of cocoa before then :). I can’t wait until it’s fully up and running. The last project that wraps this up is going to be something quite spectacular (if I do say so myself) so stay tuned!

If you want to see the final reveal, you'll find all our social media icons at the top of this post so be sure to follow us! And if you're just getting into stencilling and want to learn how, head to our post (below where you see our logo), for more tips, tricks and a link to more stencilling projects on Birdz of a Feather).

Crochet for a Cure

If you haven’t heard, we’ve just launched a pattern shop, where we’re donating 100% of our proceeds to Alzheimer’s. You’ll find patterns, like our signature Kayla Pillow, Air Planter Pods and Tooth Fairy Pillow (shown below), available to purchase as a donation to our Alzheimer’s fundraiser.

Come  visit us to purchase a pattern; with 100% going to charity, it's a win-win!