Fall Hanger Wreath

Well after a 15 month hiatus I'm finally posting again!

Materials:
~ Shoebox
~ Scissors
~ Hot Glue
~ Paint
~ Hanger

To start out I cut a bunch of leaves out of an old shoebox. I've used diaper boxes for cutouts before but liked the shoebox a lot better because it's not as thick.

I need to make some orange paint so I found a recipe on Pinterest. It was kinda thick but I liked the effect of it. It's called Puffy Paint.

Equal parts flour, salt, water. Food coloring as desired.

(I did 1 TB each and it made plenty for this project)

Brown, orange, yellow and dark red

I used a hanger as my base so I bent it into the shape I wanted. Then I traced that shape onto some newspaper so that as I was gluing the leaves together I could keep them in the right shape. I glued all the leaves together so the whole thing was now one big piece.

To attach the glued leaves onto the hanger I just used some duct tape. I might add some hot glue along with it to make it's really stable.

And that's it :) Later I'm going to add some pine cones but I like it just like this too.

Total Cost:

~ Shoebox: $0.00
~ Scissors: $0.00
~ Hot Glue: $0.00
~ Paint: $0.00
~ Hanger: $0.00

Fall Hanger Wreath: Total Cost ~ $0.00

Nursery Letters -- Baby's Name

Over the next several months I will be changing my little girl's room into a girl/boy room. I'm going to use yellow as my main color and started by putting up little M's name on her wall.

Materials:
~ Cardboard
~ Paint
~ Paint Samples (opt.)
~ Fake Grass (opt.)
~ Twine (opt.)
~ Staples/Sewing Pins

I started by cutting out the letters of M's name from an old box (of diapers . . . fitting for nursery decor right?).

I painted them white first and then put yellow paint on top.

To add some pazzaz I cut out little bits of "grass" and "leaves" from my paint samples and used a glue-stick to add them to some of the letters.
(I'm going to do a grass/leaves theme with butterflies on the girls' side and birds on the boys' side)

I took my paint samples again and cut out some butterflies to place around the letters.

To do the grass I cut some of my fake grass to the size I wanted and then tied some twine around a few, making little bunches. I slowly pulled off the tied twine and stapled that to the wall then I stuck the grass back inside.

And the finished product...
(I put this picture through editing and changed the letters. It's not her real name but it gives you an idea of the end result and I can still just keep her as my little M :) Thanks for understanding) 

Total Cost:

~ Cardboard: $0.00
~ Paint: $0.00
~ Paint Samples (opt.): $0.00
~ Fake Grass (opt.): $0.00 -- had some on hand
~ Twine (opt.): $0.00 -- had some on hand
~ Staples/Sewing Pins: $0.00

Nursery Letters: Total Cost ~ $0.00

Flowers for the Bathroom Counter

My bathroom counter was just ... blah ... there was nothing there to catch your attention, nothing to ooh and ahh over. In our old apartment I didn't realize this because our bathroom was pretty small and I had done the shower curtain (here) and the beads for over the toilet (here). In our new place though, the shower/toilet area is kind of sectioned off from the counter/sink area so it desperately needed something! It was begging me to add something, anything, to make it pretty! I decided to agree to its demands and create something for my countertop :)

Materials:
~Fake flowers
~Styrofoam, cylinder shape (cylindrical? Is that a word?)
~Paint

I have been going through withdrawals...Hobby Lobby withdrawals. In our old place we lived like 2 miles away! Now we've moved 25 min further south and no closer to the next Hobby Lobby location. Sadly I have had to give up my frequent (sometimes VERY frequent) trips to the Hob Lob and I've tried to get my fix at other stores closer to home. I've realized though that there aren't any craft stores close to me! Because of this dilemma I found myself wandering through Family Dollar a few weeks ago hoping and dreaming that I would find something to use for a new project. And I did!!!!!! Hallelujah!

I found a wall full of fake flowers and some Styrofoam of all shapes and sizes. I decided to make a little flower vase for my bathroom. So I picked out three small bouquets and a cylinder Styrofoam "vase".

The white bouquet I picked out must have been some Easter special or something. It had this weird green, glitter egg right in the middle. ...Um... no thanks...

This is much better, don't you agree?
I played around with the arrangement in my hands until I found something I liked and then I stuck the bouquets inside my "vase"
I grabbed some paint that I used on my block frames (here) and painted over my "vase" to give it more of a vase feel. That was it :) Easy as pie! (By the way, why is this a saying? Making pie is hard!)

Before...
After...

What do you think? Do you like it?

Total Cost:
~Fake flowers: $1.50
~Styrofoam vase: $1.00
~Paint: $0.00

Flowers/Vase: Total Cost ~ $2.50

Oil Painting

This is not a craft that I made, but it sure is one that I'll enjoy! My brother-in-law is an oil painter and he recently finished a piece for me and my husband to hang in our kitchen. Thank you!!

Isn't is beautiful?!

I love the texture on the strawberries. You can literally see the seeds!


And you can see the pulp on the oranges! He's got a lot of talent!

My brother-in-law has a blog that you all NEED to check out! It's tnpaint.blogspot.com and he recently opened an ETSY shop so you can buy his paintings. He's also currently taking commissions for original paintings as well. Check out his blog and his ETSY shop! Some of my favorites are Death of an Artist, Winter Lake, and Aguacate. There's honestly nothing like having original art work in your home!