There's not much to them really- you just need some time. Ok, a lot of time. I'm not sure if they were worth making myself as I saw some similar items randomly while shopping. Nonetheless, here they are. And yes, they are really sparkly, so I do love them.
First I purchased three 8" cones at the dollar store. (This is great- when you see them, you should grab them. Oh, and some of the floral foam, and the wreaths. They're much pricier at Michael's and Joann's.)
I sprayed them with Silver Spray paint. But, get this. I found that spraypaint actually melts the styrofoam. So, to help, my advice is to not target the paint in one area too long, or else use craft paint. You'll need to color the cone though, because the rhinestones don't all match up, and there will be foam space in between. It would look rather tacky if you could see white foam in between the silver (or whatever color you use!) foam!
I had purchased a 1 lb bag of silver rhinestones with a 40% off coupon. they were the nice kind- not plastic... maybe acrylic? perhaps glass... The bag came to about $8. (After the three trees, I still have about 1/2 the bag left)
Use your hot glue gun, and add a dab of glue to the cone itself. Stick rhinestone on. My bag contained various size stones and I took advantage of that. The other thing was that I tried to put the stones on in clumps, rather than in lines, so that they didn't look so structured, and appeared softer.
I made three of these. It took about an hour each. Fun yes, tedious yes, blingy... YES!
Even though I made three of these, I couldn't find the right place to display them together, so I added them to my mantle display on my mirrored candle holders.
I'm sure you've got some sparkle, and bling around your house this year, no? Are these cheesy? I can't seem to take a good photo of the mantle, but I swear they look better in person. I blame the 70's style brick work that extends floor to ceiling.
Only 9 days till Christmas, yeehaw!