Autumn's Home Beauty

August 30, 1:08 PMHome and Family ExaminerSandra K. Bouie

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Capture the beauty of autumn!

Want to give your home a fall festive look?  Try using a piece of nature to add an autumn appeal to your home.  Every fall, nature sheds it's tree branches with colorful fall leaves.  Gather the green, orange, yellow and reddish brown autumn leaves up from your lawn. 

You can make plastic place mats, napkins, tablecloths and other dainty and colorful templates with these leaves.  Put the fallen leaves in a book for a few days to flatten them out.  Then remove the leaves and place a few inside of some wax paper. 

Trim the wax paper the size of a small place mat.  If you have access to a laminator, get it out or go to a local print shop.  Place two clear plastic laminating sheets, front and back, over the wax paper sheets of flat leaves.  Send them through the press and you have a beautiful leaf placemat to set on your dining room table.  You can make a whole set of four leafed placemats.

Get real crafty and create cloth fabric placemats, tablecloths, and napkins.  Take some plain beige, cloth tablemats and napkins and strategically place some of the leaves on them.  Or try a plain green tablecloth and layer it with orange and reddish brown leaves. Take a pencil and trace outlines along the edges of the leaves. 

Use a liner brush to trace over the pencil outlines.  With a flat paint brush, carefully paint the outlined leaves, brown, green or orange.  Study the lines on the leaves themselves and draw similar ones on the outlined leaves.  When painting them, make sure you stay inside the outlines! 

Paint small dashes along the borders of the place mat.  For napkin rings, use a small strip the size of a paper napkin and roll it into a tube shape.  Find the long edge of the napkin and take a small leaf and repeat the same steps above.  Place an attractive napkin ring onto the painted napkin.  Wa-la!  You have an autumn festive set for your dining room table.  Enjoy the luxurious beauty of fall colors anytime you want!