The completion of "the big N"

Very exited to have finally finished this on 1/29. All in all I probably had 10 hours end, but most of that was done in 30 min chunks since a hot glue gun and an infant don't mix well. The only cost I had in it, besides time, was the spray paint. (And honestly, I loved that part! I have been spray painting all kinds of things!) I am quite pleased with the finished product. 

The Big N

It now hangs above our new buffet table with another of my recent projects, The shelf above the buffet was salvaged out of a dumpster - well, more accurately the wood was. I sanded it, rubbed it with stain to match the buffet top and used shelving brackets from Ikea ($4 ea.) to create the first of our reclaimed shelves. All in I think there is perhaps $10 (brackets, stain and sandpaper) and about an hour of labor. You will be seeing more of these around our house.

Of note as well is the blue seated chair which we picked up for $5 at a thrift store. I haven't yet decided whether I want to repaint the seat base. Thoughts?

Below are two other little projects. Diffusers are expensive to buy in the stores, and since I just recently purchased my first round of essential oils, I thought I would make my own. These bottles were $2 a piece from Walmart. I am brain scrounging items around my house I might use for more, but I loved these two little bottles. Bamboo skewers are the reeds. I used baby oil (which I found a site online that said I could) for a base, but am not pleased with it, so there will be modifications made when I can figure out what I prefer. 

The Big N

Do you ever feel like Pinterest ruins your life? Ok, maybe that is a slight exaggeration, but it certainly inspires me to add to the chaos of our home instead of decreasing it (no matter how many "how to get organized" articles/tips I pin!). And I have a bad habit of looking at a picture, thinking "I can do that" and not thinking through the whole process.

Separate but related thought... the first 1.5 yrs of our marriage, I didn't really craft much (work, kids, pregnant, infant, etc.) so my poor husband had no idea what he was getting himself into. *grin*

Today's Pinterest Project of DOOM:

OK - first the blogger said this was quick and easy - second she used a large wooden letter she got from Michael's. Third, in my mind this letter was large... not 9". 

So, here was my idea (because I didn't want to pay for a letter or drive to get one, etc)

We had a huge cardboard insert from the box for the hot water heater we replaced and so I cut 4 large N's out of the box and hot glued them together and then spray painted them.

I have been collecting sticks for another project that hasn't even really gotten started yet and Zeke and I have been spray painting them. So we used those to start this project. Gold, silver, white, black and clear.

I started gluing the sticks to the board last week.

A few thoughts:

Obviously sticks are not all the same size nor are they straight.

Also, since I put 4 pieces of cardboard together for stability, it created unfinished sides. I thought about many different ways of finishing off the sides and finally decided to try putting sticks on the sides as well. We will see how that works.

It is hard to tell whether I like this or not because I don't have enough done to step away and take the long look at it.

But at least I had this guy for company.

little bits of craftsy stuff

Tuesday my sister and niece and I spent the day together and we experimented with fusing plastic. First thought - this is not as easy as it looks. It is not difficult but it takes some experimentation depending on your iron, the thickness of the plastic bags, etc.



Different plastics have different thicknesses and different flexibilities.



I have a lot of practicing to do to get this the way I would want it... and also, I don't shop enough (outside grocery stores) and I try to take my own recycled bags whenever I can remember, so I don't have a lot of colorful bags. The whole point of this craft is to recycle what I have... so I need to put some more thought into this.

Slightly more successful is my crocheted rug from old sheets. When I finished slicing up one sheet this is what the ball of 'yarn' looked like:



I have started the crocheting process but no pics yet.