Spring projects

I've been trying to come up with some projects that I can do with what I have.  I have so many odds and ends, and not a whole lot of room to store them, and not much money to buy new things, so I wanted to see what I could do.

I was reorganizing my bookshelves in my living room and found that I had a large empty spot when I was done, so I found an old candelabra that Mr Mojo had given to me a few years ago, and then I scrounged up some eggs that I had left over from other projects -- I don't have any primer spray paint, so they got left the way they were -- and some Spanish moss that I also had, and put the two together.  A little bit of hot glue to form the nest shapes around the eggs.  They aren't glued to the candelabra though.

And then, I still had a LOT of book pages left over from my pantry project, and lots of cardboard, so I cut out a wreath shape from the cardboard -- you don't need a foam wreath form after all! -- and using a lot of hot glue, I attached the pages to the shape.  Then using some spray paint, I gave it a bit more color, and then glued ribbon to the back.

Altogether, I had all of the parts I needed for the projects, so both ones cost me nothing.  Yay!




I linked!

A front door transformation

While waiting for paint to dry, and between chores around the house, I thought about the wreath out on my front door, and how – while I love the wreath – it can’t look very good on the door as it stands.

Front door BEFORE:

With a wreath in front of that?? Ridiculous. Messy. Uck. But the Private Residence sign is a NECESSITY.  We live on a business lot, in front of a business, with a parking lot for a front yard.  No sign = random strangers walking into my house.  (We try locking the door, but it’s an unusual lock, we have no key, and  locking means we aren't’ always able to get back in.)

I had bought a cheap picture frame at Walmart for $3 the other day while picking up paint for my pantry project and had it sitting around, but wasn’t totally sold on it just yet.  I decided I wasn’t a big fan of the color and style of the frame on the pantry, and I was struck by inspiration!!  I could remove the signs from the door!

I grabbed some scissors, removed the frame leg – the thing that can make it stand on its own – and wrote out a quick note similar to the previous, and used Gorilla Glue to adhere a strong magnet to the back of the frame, and voila!!

Front door AFTER:

MUCH much better, don’t you think??  I’ll probably manage to print something out that looks nicer later, but for now, that works just fine for me!



I linked to:

Easter Wreath

I finished my first real project!!  I'm so excited!  It is a project that's morphed in my mind through various different stages, having different ideas of how I want it to turn out.  First, it was just going to be a recreation of a wreath I saw somewhere else, a foam wreath with Spanish moss glued on it and Easter eggs glued on top of that.  But you know, I could never find any foam wreath forms!!  Granted, I've been somewhat avoiding craft stores, because I end up spending too much at them.

But today, I came across a grapevine wreath at Walmart for only $3.50!  And I was inspired.  A variation of the original wreath I had in mind, and some of these variable wreaths I've seen some of the other bloggers do, with the ability to change up the wreath for the season and holiday.  BRILLIANT.

So I brought home the wreath, grabbed some spare fabric that's about the same color as the moss, some floral wire, some silk flowers I had left over from a trip to the Dollar Tree, some ribbon, the Spanish moss, and some plastic eggs from the Dollar Tree, and had at it!

I didn't take any pictures of the process, but the wreath was originally just a bare vine wreath.  I cut out strips from the fabric and literally tied them around the wreath and cut the excess fabric.  Using my hot glue gun, I glued the moss to the fabric so that I could easily remove it later with less mess.

Then I wound the ribbon around the wreath and glued the ends together.  I made the bow using ribbon and floral wire and then secured it to the other ribbon with hot glue and kept it more firmly in place with more wire.

I tucked the flowers into place without really securing them -- though I may go back and do that later -- and the eggs had holes in them, so I just stuck the wire through the holes, wrapped it around the wreath, and voila!

The finished product:


The bow:


The back, showing the fabric tied around (holy camera flash, Batman!):


There's paint all over my fingers, I'm in the middle of repainting my pantry -- it's just a simple particleboard, two-door pantry, but I'm tired of it, so I'm changing it.  (So many craft blogs inspire me!)  Also, yes, haha, the door is labeled "Door".  I labeled several items around my house to encourage my son to read.  Yay for creativity!

Honestly, compared to so many other projects I see, it's not great, but it's my first real project, so I wanted to share!  So, I posted this at: