"GRAPES" (they're a shoe- in!)

How many of you have packets of DESICCANT SILICA GEL  sitting in your shoe boxes just waiting to become grapes!!!!!???  Well now's the time.!

FUTURE GRAPES!

Pour silica beads onto WAX PAPER and remove the super- sized ones.

I'm using a very old Kelly's Brown Glass Paint but I also tried out some Delta Transparent Glass Paint in Amber and it worked just as well.

  STEP 1:   Mix the silica beads into the brown paint.  The Brown will provide a base color for the red grapes and will also take the monotony of a single color out and make the grapes more authentic looking.

The grapes are now coated with the brown.  They will lighten up quite a bit as they dry down.

  STEP 2:   This is the second color that I'm using.  Gallery Glass is available at Michael's craft supply and probably most craft stores.  I'm using Magenta Royal.  It is like a soft wine color when dry.  When I first tried this out it was sooo freaky because I didn't know if it would do what I hoped it would.  I had another option, Gallery Glass Berry Red, but I went with the Magenta and it worked out beautifully.

On the same paper squeeze out a good sized blob of Magenta  Royal paint and mix all of the brown beads into it...  and this is what you get.  But these are way to glossy and red grapes are more "frosty" looking so we add STEP 3.... White Chalk

Scrape out some white chalk onto the same wax paper that you have been using.  You will need to add more Magenta Royal Paint and mix the beads into the paint chalk mixture.  It  will look like what you see below.

Try not worry.  They look awful but they dry down really nicely...

SEE!!??

STEP 4:  This is a piece of dried flower that I believe is  called "Statice",  and I  clipped off a twig that I thought would make a good shape for the grapes to be glued to.

STEP 5:  Clip off the dried flowers so that just the stem is left.

And Yes, I DID try the Quick Grip but it was not good.  I had to try several types of glues and this worked the best.  You have to coat the stem with the white TACKY GLUE and let it set up and tacky dry on the stem so that the glue from the paint will stick to it.  This is the part that takes patience because of the fight against gravity.  The beads will go on and then fall off..... it is better to let a small cluster set up onto the stem rather than try to get them all on at one time as I tried to do.  

The stem withe the glue on it.

These are the red Grapes on the vine and ready to be served.  These would look even better with a bit of greenery a grape leaf maybe.?  I plan on doing a small market basket with these and the multitude of peaches and breads that I showed in my first blog post "Nights before Christmas".  I made some market baskets back in 1993 and I just found one that I had tucked away.  So once I get one together, I'll show you how it turned out.  Till we meet again, have fun making Grapes; your shoes will thank You for it !

elizabeth