Monica Wants It: Spider Web Votive Covers {DIY Tutorial}

I remember when I posted my first Halloween tutorial on August 31st, I thought I was nuts.

Now today it’s October 16th, and I only have a foyer vignette, candy corn centerpiece, Illuminated wreath and porch done. No Halloween mantle anywhere to be found.

Oops.

So, now it’s time to get to creating an awesome Halloween mantle using stuff I have already. As you all know by now, I love to decorate with candles, so today I have another tutorial on how to create some spider web votive covers using the Silhouette SD + black cardstock + Glue Dots®.

Open your Silhouette SD studio, and go to My Library and open up your free spider web. The spider web I used comes free with the 50 images/files that come loaded with the software. Layer a bunch together so that you roughly have a 2x7 inch area covered. I resized my webs a bit, as you can see below, so that it would look a bit more natural. Also, I created a 2x7 rectangle so I could have a visual, plus you’ll need it in a bit.

Next use your mouse to form a rectangle around all your webs.

Right click and click “Weld”. This makes all your webs connected as one giant web.

Next we want to move our welded web onto the 2x7 rectangle. Once you have it situated, go to Object > Modify > Intersect.

This will get rid of all the web outside the 2x7 inch box leaving you with a perfect votive wrap. I then copied & pasted the web so that I had 3 on my page. Time to send it to the Silhouette to cut.

Now, here’s the point where you want to find something to do for about 10 minutes while your Silhouette cuts. And cuts some more. Then when you think it’s done IT WILL CUT SOME MORE.

What I did during this time is gather my votive holders + adhesive.

You can find the Glue Dots® I used here (removable) and here (micro).

Once your Silhouette finishes cutting, you will notice you have a lot of little pieces to fish out of the design. This will be a little tedious, and you will want to quit. Don’t. I used the back of an earring to quickly punch out all the random pieces of cardstock that didn’t end up on the mat. Which honestly, would have been worse since peeling a billion little pieces of cardstock off a sticky mat is not my idea of a good time. Call me crazy.

After all that work and effort, you are rewarded with 3 fabulous spider webs.

Grab your removable Glue Dots® & 1 votive holder. I placed one Glue Dot in the center of the glass and I used one more to adhere the ends, as seen below:

And then you have your votive covers. You’ll notice some random ends/web pieces sticking out…not to worry, that’s what the Micro Glue Dots® are for. One of these itty bitty dots, and you’ll be squared away.

I then decided to see how they’d look once the candles are lit, and I fell in love.

Ta-dah!

There you have it- a small part of my Halloween mantle. I hope to work on some more this evening, and hopefully have a full post up for you on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week. I am still a little stumped as to what to do. Do you have a link to an awesome Halloween mantle you’ve seen lately? Are you the type of person that creates mantle-scapes for every holiday/season?