Tolentreasures

Remember this from the last post? If you don't, a reminder is down at the bottom of this post. Crackle Medium, some paint and some sanding. Greens, Berry Vine and some vintage light bulbs and we are decked! Finished golf club covers... an order for a friend.  Years ago, I made a lot of these, You would so carefully cross stitch those blasted numbers on... now thanks to Pinterest, Stripes for the number! Driver, one, three and five wood! Ingenious! And here is the before picture. Just lacked some pizazz!

I can't claim this as my own, I am pretty sure it came from Marie at Marie's Country Woodcrafts http://mariescountrywoodcrafts.blogspot.com/ Go check her out, she is a wonderful painter and has the greatest patterns to sell! Pricing and marking things drives me crazy. I would much rather be creating. But, here is a little tip. Print your tags on the computer, regular card stock works great. Leave a blank area on the bottom.  Cut them in strips, Take the thread out of your sewing machine... and sew along the top edge of the blank area. It makes a nice perforated edge on your tag for your price. If the person is buying your item for a gift, they can simply tear off the bottom and leave all of your information on the tag. It not only allows the receiver of the gift to know that it was handmade, but it leaves all of your information for future sales! I know these pics are backwards, not enough coffee co...

Before you think I have some major revelation into nagging, I am just telling you one incident. I have had lots, but this one could have had some scary consequences. My MIL has been wanting new carpet for her bathroom. She has been "wanting" it for awhile. Hers was "powdery." Eww. Having lived in a house where the carpet was burned in the living room from where the previous owner had started his Harley, (another story, another time ) I wasn't totally sympathetic to "powdery." Plus, it's a tiny little bathroom and I could not imagine what they would charge to come out here in the sticks to do a tiny, little, powdery bathroom. So, JWS and I tried to talk her into tile. We lay tile, we have all the tools, and furthermore.... "Powdery" can be easily cleaned off of tiles. You would have thought that we suggested making the floor a bed of nails or hot coals...

Sheila  from Seasons of the Heart. http://seasonsofthyheart.blogspot.com/ That is who is getting the blame for this latest obsession. Ok, Blogger will not allow me to add a link. Anyway, on with the story. Monday night, after a trying day at work, I came home to a lovely package from Sheila. This pastel berry vine that was perfect around my Easter hen and eggs. These lovely candle rings that I have an idea for, just haven't put them anywhere yet because of this little goodie.   This innocent little wool flower set off the tangent that I am blaming Sheila for 100%. You see, she told me that she thought I could do something like this for my open house. So, I tried this. Made out of inexpensive felt. And then, moved on to these... And then went crazy! These are so fun to make and so fast! The best part? They use up some of the thicker wool that doesn't work real well for penny rugs. The other good part? So far, no hives! And now for the bad part. I have sheets in the washe...

You will need: Assorted liner brushes #4 lettering brush or #4 flat brush Assorted Star and Snowflake Stencils Cosmetic Sponge Wedges Decoart Americana Black Khaki Tan Slate Gray Bleached Sand Light Cinnamon Surface of choice, basecoated Black. As always, these are suggestions. Get something close and don't worry if they are not EXACTLY the same colors. I am always perusing the stencil aisle in any craft shop. There are well used stencils hanging all over the bulletin board in my painting room. You can't beat a stencil for adding perfect shaped stars to a project. You can always shade and highlight them to make them look painted, but it sure is a lot easier to stencil them than to try to draw or trace them. There are quite a few snowflake ones hanging there also. Yours don't have to be the same, get creative! I love cosmetic wedges for stenciling. Just a little hint, the ones from Dollar Tree are not quite dense enough. Upgrade to the discount chain ones. Frugal as I am,...

For those of you following along, there was this aggressive, impulsive moment when I thought I could do thirty projects in thirty days. Everything started off great, but somewhere along the line, I got way behind. Trying to get back on track. so 12. Decorating the church, check! 13. The Stewart plaque in the previous post, check. 14. The other name plaque that I cannot show, check. 15. The coffee pot above, check. 16.  This snowman board, check. And... 17. Garren's stocking. Not to worry, 18, 19, and 20 are laying on the living room floor in various stages of completion. Stockings for the rest of Garren's family. So, that being said, I have 13 projects to go and nine days! Yikes! To be fair, part of the things that I wanted to do involved Christmas decorating and since I have new carpet coming on Friday, and since half the house needs moved to the other half of the house. Decorating seemed senseless. So back to work today.  Shouldn't I feel more refreshed and ready to ...

Project #3 Customer order that has been waiting for me to see it in my mind.  Sometimes, you just have to wait for inspiration. It is for a baby gift and I was not sure how babyish to make it. Done! Project Four. The beginning of the De-Apple-ization of the Dining Room. Found these shutters and the berry vine at the store that I took the ornaments to late yesterday afternoon.  I loved them and could see them right here. Much simpler than what I had there. And just ready for a bit of a change. Tomorrow? Hopefully another De-Apple-ization Project. Maybe two I have one started, Can't wait. Woohoo! I am one ahead! 

In just a few (maybe more) easy steps, you too can paint these lovely star and berry vines! Doesn't that just sound like an infomercial? TV, here I come! The basecoating. I use Decoart colors. They rock! Using a lot of paint, don't be afraid, load it up. Lay in Black, Russet and Cocoa. Keep it random and messy and wet...make sure you work fast enough that it stays wet. Then, Using a sponge, Sponge all the colors together. Try to leave light and dark areas. Don't overblend it. Then paint the outside edges Russet and drybrush here and there with Heritage Brick. With Milk Chocolate, thinned on a nice crisp flat brush, paint in those checkers. Everything needs checkers. What you should have so far. See that nice blending on the background colors. Now for the vine. You will need a nice, long, script liner brush. Thin down a brush mix of Black and Milk Chocolate and lay in vines the whole way around..or long if you are not doing a round piece. They do it again with just Mi...