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Giant Icicles

These icicles, made with window screen and plastic wrap adorned with white lights and baubles, are as irregularly beautiful as the real thing.

From the book, Christmas: 101 Wondrous Ideas

What You Need:

Elaborate on the ice cascades that nature uses to decorate your roofline.

Window screen (available in rolls at hardware stores or home centers)
Scissors
Clear rhinestones, large silver sequins, and other embellishments
Boxes of plastic wrap
Strings of miniature white lights
Thin aluminum wire
Needle-nose pliers
Gloves
Hot-glue gun and glue sticks
Hammer and nails or staple gun and staples

Instructions:

Consider installing your icicles early in the season so that real icicles can form between the artificial ones.

1. Cut screen into a long, narrow triangle. (Our icicles ranged from 15 to 36 inches long and about 8 to 14 inches across the top.) Scatter some embellishments on the screen.

2. Bunch up a long, narrow cylinder of plastic wrap; place over the embellishments along center of screen triangle. (The plastic wrap will keep the trims secure.)

3. Arrange white lights on plastic wrap, leaving both ends free at top of triangle (for stringing to other lights). Try to keep lightbulbs visible outside of plastic wrap and tuck wire within wrap.

4. Bring long edges of the triangle together and secure with pieces of small twisted wire, leaving top open. When completely wired closed, scrunch and mold to create irregular icicle appearance. Wear gloves during this step, as the screen edges and wire ends are prickly.

5. Hot-glue or wire some embellishments to outside of icicle. Hang from eaves or gutters either by wiring, nailing, or stapling. Hang one at a time, spacing as desired and connecting light strands when needed.