How to make a wood slice tree in under 30 minutes

Christmas is coming fast.  If you need something quick to make for a gift or your own mantel, this wood slice tree is very fast to create. 

I happen to cut my wood slices some time ago to make tags.  I cut up more wood slices than I needed.  So, I used the leftover slices for this project.

Cutting the wood slices took 10 minutes.  Cutting the star with my jigsaw took 5 minutes.  Arranging on the board and hot gluing the pieces was another 5 minutes…after the hot glue gun warmed up. 

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Instructions

Start by laying out your wood slices on the board.   Laying out the tree before gluing helps make sure you’re getting a tree shape.  Some of the wood slices are not perfect circles.  You may need to rotate a slice or two.  Another idea is to glue the wood slices on artist canvas.   

Decide if you want to paint the board or canvas.  I personally like the white background with the slices.  My board happened to be white.  

Paint the star.  I dry brushed my star with the same white paint as the board.  Then removed some of the paint while still wet with a damp paper towel.  

Make the trunk by pulling off pieces of bark from a wood slice.  You could also use a couple of sticks from your yard for a trunk. 

Fire up the hot glue gun with wood glue sticks.  Did you notice, I said, wood glue sticks?  If you’ve ever tried to hot glue pieces of wood you notice it doesn’t work well.  The wood glue sticks are made to work with wood.  You can read more of my hot glue gun tips here. 

Glue the pieces in place.  I like to apply the glue to the slices then put back in place.  This took me under 2 minutes. 

Now that fast project is done…time to think about Christmas dinner.  Let me know what you’re planning for Christmas dinner in comments below or tag me @countrydesignstyle on Instagram.