CREPE PAPER TRUNK CAN BE PADDED WITH COTTON.
Wrap stems with ¼″ or ½″ strip of brown crepe paper cut across grain of package, and fastened with library paste or Elmer’s glue. Bend wire “fronds” into proper shape. Drill or punch hole in base. Smear base of tree and hole with Elmer’s glue, mount tree in place. Glue dirt or grass in place at base of tree.
Water
A quiet pond may be made with a mirror. Glue the mirror to the cigar box before installing anything else. Glue in the background picture next, then carve chunks of styrofoam for the remaining foreground. Slope “shores” down toward mirror “pond”. Let the edges of the styrofoam cover edges of mirror, making an irregular shape for the pond. Glue styrofoam in place with Elmer’s. For added realism, ripples may be added to the mirror surface, using clear varnish and oil paints. Mix a tiny bit of Prussian or “Thalo” blue with some clear varnish. Use just enough to tint the varnish. Flow varnish on surface of mirror, to a depth of about ¹/₃₂″. Before varnish is completely dry, use an empty “Flit” gun to pump air over the surface. This air will form ripples which, as the varnish dries, will remain on the surface. It may be necessary to repeat the air pumping a few times before the varnish surface hardens.
A stream can be made using broken glass and some Duco or Testor’s Airplane cement. The light blue glass from broken telephone line insulators, light blue Mexican glass or other glass of a light blue color may be used. Put the glass in a paper sack, then put that sack into two more sacks. Put the sacks on a solid surface and break the glass into small pieces by hitting the sack with a hammer.
Make your foreground with styrofoam or balsa wood chunks, covering the material with the paper mache mix and working out (modelling) the stream bed with the mix. Let the mache harden before completing the stream. While the mix is still soft, push in weeds, cattails, any correct streamside plants, making them from hemp rope or from other previously described materials.
ROPE STRANDS DIPPED IN GLUE OR PLASTER FOR CATTAILS.... ROCKS PLACED IN DRY STREAM BED.