Project: Tulip Menu Card

Anticipation will be high when you announce your holiday feast with these festive menu cards. For a buffet, adapt this idea to create a name card for each dish.

Click here to see larger image

GATHER
• Tracing paper
• Yellow card stock (one 8 1/2-by-11-inch piece for each menu and stand)
• White glue or rubber cement
• Demel drill and mandrel bit fitted with a cut-off wheel
• Blown eggs, clean and dry, one for each holder
• Floral stickers, 1/4- and 1/2-inch diameter (or use any motif you like)


CREATE
1 Trace the tulip pattern onto tracing paper and cut it out.

Click tulip image for a printable tulip pattern

2 Using a computer (or hand-lettering), compose and print your menu on card stock, postitioning the text so the tulip patterncan be centered over it. Center the patttern over the menu and trace the tulip outline. Cut it out. Repeat to make as many menus as you need.

3 For each egg stand, cut a piece of card stock measuring 1/2 by 4 inches. Form it into a ring, overlapping the ends slightly, and glue together.

4 Using the drill, gently gently cut a slot in the top of each egg to hold the menu card.

5 Affix stickers to each egg and stand. Set the eggs into the stands and insert a menu card in each. Put one at each diner's place when you set your holiday table.

Tip: Use paper clips or doll-size clothespins to secure the holder rings while the glue dries.

Photography by Matthew Mead

See more of Matthew's Easter Egg creations:
• Silver and Gold
• Spring Pansy Vase
• Tiny Chalkboards

Matthew Mead is the style editor at Country Home magazine, Holiday with Matthew Mead, and a line of ornaments with Wedgwood and The American Folk Art Museum. He lives in New Hampshire.

Excerpted from Easter Eggs: 40 Fabulous Projects for the Whole Family by Matthew Mead. Copyright 2007 by Matthew Mead and Downtown Bookworks Inc. Excerpted with permission by Chronicle Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced without permission in writing from the publisher.