I made a Lotto/Earring tree raffle prize for my daughters fundraiser.

Supplies

You will need:

Small Planter

Dense Cardboard or Chip Board

Twist ties

Hot Glue & Wood Glue

Scrap of 2x4 or sand for weight

Cellophane Wrapping

Mini Clothes pins

Paint

Scroll saw, Laser Cutter or X-ACTO knife

Step 1: Tree and Base Design

I recreated a tree I found online that is made of two pieces of dense cardboard that slide together to make a 3 dimensional shape. The tree was designed to have holes at the tips of the branches to hold earrings. This is a very intricate shape that is best cut out with a scroll saw or in my case laster cutter. If using something like Matt board you could use an X-ACTO.

Since it is a tree after all, I picked up a cheap planter at the dollar store to serve as the base. I measured the diameter of the upper lip and the main body so I could cut out two additional round pieces to lock the tree in and make it removable so it could be used later. One of the round supports had a cross shape that matched the tree trunk cut out. The second piece was glued to the first it so the tree would not fall through the hole. You can see in the illustration one round disk sits on the ledge of the upper lip and the second fits inside the main body of the planter. I painted the round supports green and set them aside to dry.

After the paint dried small pieces of wire were wrapped around each root and threaded through small holes. Then they were twisted together, locking the tree on the base. I hot glued a small piece of wood on the inside bottom of the planter to give it some weight and keep it from being top heavy. You could also use sand, gravel or clay to ad weight. Think of it like a ship on the water. It needs ballast so it won't tip over.

Step 2: Planting the Tree and Adding Foliage.

Once every thing was set I connected the tree support to the planter with a few dabs of hot glue. Don't over do it, you want to be able to take it apart so someone can use the planter and the tree. The support and ballast are the only things that are discardable.

I used mini clothes pins to attach all the lotto cards to the tree. For some more texture I ended up shredding lotto entry slips and placing it around the tree like grass. Then the whole thing was wrapped with orange cellophane and tied with a knot at the top.

This was a fun project that earned a great donation for the raffle.

I hope you like it.