Easy Cheap Christmas Presents

OK, what gets me started on this particular topic is a documentary I saw last night on Johnnie Mercer. He was born and raised in Savannah [where I used to live and would dearly love to live again]. The documentary ended with a long shot of his grave in the family plot at Bonaventure Cemetery. If you're familiar with Savannah you know this place very well. It's a very old graveyard outside Savannah on the banks of the  Bull River.

In the long shot of Johnnie's grave there's a clear view of his mother's grave....OK I know this is sort of a convoluted explanation. But- I have a lovely rubbing of the top of her grave on my bedroom wall. It is a fantastically ornate Celtic cross that Johnny and his sister had commisioned as the art for the top of the grave slab. 

Allie [my daughter] and I had already made several framed pieces of cheap art from the words on tombs at Bonaventure. We used copy paper and a black crayon for the rubbings then she framed several in Dollar Store Black frames for a collection that set above her TV in her apartment.  

I loved Mrs Mercer's huge celtic cross [it is over 5 feet tall]. But the day Allie and I were at Bonaventure we only had standard copy paper. Allie is very smart, so several weeks later she went back to Bonaventure with a roll of Dollar Store wrapping paper. It was printed on one side but white on the backside. With Josh's help [he was her fiancee at the time, now her dear husband] they made me an incredible rubbing of the whole cross.

It sat around rolled up for a year, until my own dear husband had it framed for me as a Christmas gift. When we remade our bedroom over as a Medieval retreat, the huge celtic cross was a perfect fit. It sits at the peak of the very high ceiling and gives the impression of a black and white stained glass window.

Now I know you're saying, "Getting something that big custom framed is not frugal or cheap." No you'd be right it isn't, but our original idea for rubbings of words or dates and framing them in Black Dollar Store frames is extremely cheap. I have one such piece of art that is just a date- 1797. It is both graphic and old at the same time. It is framed in a small acryillic frame [Dollar Store]. It seems to float in space and and I love it!!! Allie's favorite piece was the word 'Beloved' that we found on an out of the way grave stone at Bonaventure.

If the words or dates are quite small you can mat them in black or mount them on black and white toile wrapping paper before framing to lend the art a very custom look.

So you see you could make a whole raft of unique and lovely artististic gifts by just finding a suitable old graveyard and arming yourself with copy paper and a black crayon. Hope you'll give this cheap and easy way to create one of a kind art a try.

I'll try to take a photo of my Celtic Cross and post it so you can see how it looks.