Make your own wood tray!

       First things first :  I found the tutorial for how to make this tray at : http://www.shanty-2-chic.com/2012/04/diy-magazine-tray.html .  This blog is fantastic for tutorials on how to make your own, well, lots of things! I didn't add hardware other than the handles.  These handy dandy wood trays are made from furring strips- not the smoothest wood you could use, but it adds to the distressed, less than perfect look.  It also made this tray around $5 ish dollars or so to make- including the handles.  It's a pretty decent size tray too- sturdy!
       So the details:  I painted parts of it brown, then aqua.  I decided it was a bit too aqua for my liking, added a vinyl stencil, then painted white.  Before the paint dried, I peeled off the stencil, revealing the undercoat I'd distressed a bit.  I'm still not completely sold on how I painted it, but I'm not sure what I'd do differently.  I have more wood in my garage to make another one, and I want to put some kind of a word on the side, I just can't figure out what I want to put.  I can't really paint it until I decide. Bahhh! 
      I definitely recommend making these- I did use my miter saw instead of the hand saw the tutorial recommended.  Maybe mine was really dull, but I tried it and it just was not a happening for me.  Then I ended up with an uneven cut.  Double Bahhh!

Saturday Market

This was my one and only attempt at a Saturday Market this year. I joined in with my in-laws in Tillamook- they sold polished rocks that they've gathered from Oregon beaches. I tried a few different things to sell: signs- made with paint, crackling medium, and Cricut vinyl lettering.

These were some of my favorite- I tried sets of words and phrases- with 3 two by four by 4 inch cuts of wood. Some I just painted with a base and top coat (contrasting) then distressed, others I used crackling medium. I then cut out the lettering with my Cricut.

I also tried these little easel frames (mentioned with the original idea and link to the owner of the idea in a previous links) with paper Mod Podged on and sanded around the edges. I did paint around the edges and backs of the wood first with a coordinating paint color, then added ribbon.

Here's a "group" shot. Right behind the signs are some roughly 5 1/2 by 5 1/2 blocks of wood, decorated in the same way as the easels. I cut up a 2x6 to make those. I like them because they can fit a bigger picture on them. I made almost $50 at the market, not too bad I suppose- sure beats a kick in the teeth! :)

Scrapping, kinda, with wood

I bought these wood hangers of sorts from Craft Warehouse. The example they showed had a picture scrapped on it. I decided to do the same thing, only after going from one idea to another with some pictures of a friend's boys. I'm really pretty pleased with how this ended up- especially since I finally decided on what to do with these "future projects" after they sat for a year in my craft stash.... No, I don't hoard... my husband would disagree- I purge every so often- a year or two is generally the maximum amount of time I'll keep something... but I digress. :) I suppose everything is pretty obvious what I did- stitching, distressing, brads, inking... Once I decided what I was going to do it went fast- only 6 months in the making or so, since I got the pictures...

Laundry Room hangers

I decided to make this board of hangers for the things like girls tights and other items that needed to be hung up to air dry- mostly children's items... I had been draping these things over the supports to the wire shelf above my washer and dryer, and thought there needed to be a better (and more attractive..) way to go about it. I bought a piece of scrap wood from Home Depot for 51 cents- yup, not even a dollar. I cut it into 2 pieces - one longer (which is this project) and one a bit shorter ( for the next project for lost socks that I'm working on). I used my handy dandy miter saw- my husband is getting his money's worth out of his Christmas gift to me :)- love that man of mine! Anyhow... I crackled it with brown underneath and Winter blue on the top, then distressed slightly around the edges. I bought 4 hangers at $2.57 a pair at Walmart in ORB (Oil Rubbed Bronze). I had to buy slightly shorter screws though, because the wood was not as thick as the screws were long. I dabbed paint over the heads of the screws to conceal the silver finish that stuck out like a sore thumb. I used my Cricut to cut out letters to come up with the little saying on it. It amuses me, since it's for my "hang ups"- oh, if only it were that easy to take care of our hang ups! :). I'm going to hang it up on my laundry room wall across from the washer and dryer. So if you're on the lookout for cheap(er) wood in the home improvement store, look in their scrap bin where they're selling partial cuts of wood for cheap. You can always peruse construction sites and ask for their scraps, or ask the home improvement stores for any scraps they might be willing to just give away. I'm holding out for some scrap beadboard... for another project...

"Father" mini album

This is a "companion" album to a mini album I posted last year of a "mother" mini album I made for a good friend. I knew as soon as she showed me the pictures of her husband with each of her 6 boys, that they should be scrapped as a companion album to the one I made her of herself with each of her boys. I stitched and distressed the pictures, along with inking. I looked up the father quotes online- I really love the last one about the grass. (Actually, I like all of them, since I picked them out from a bunch of father quotes...)

True Beauty Layout

This layout all originated from a fantastic picture that was taken of my sister and niece last summer/spring. I knew as soon as I saw it that it needed to be scrapped and framed. It was a struggle finding the right papers to go with the colors in the pictures, but I didn't want to turn it to black and white because it was so vibrant. I was fortunate enough to get to see my best buddy over the weekend and she helped me figure out the last bit of "what to put where". Gotta love that friend of mine :) I used a copious amount of Stickles glitter glue on the layout too.. I think it really added to the feminine look with the more masculine colors of the cardstock.

First project using my miter saw

This is my first project using my miter saw that I asked for (and received) for Christmas. Woohoo!!!!! Once I got headphones so the sound wouldn't make me completely weenie out from using it, the task was a lot easier to stand. I cut 8, 7, 6, 5, and 4 inch pieces of wood from a 2 x 4, then set to sanding and painting. I considered crackling, but figured with the patterned paper (and asking my best buddy who also is crafty), decided to go with painting 2 colors on the wood and distressing to show the bottom layer of paint. After that, I just used Mod Podge to glue strips of paper on, and cut names out with my Cricut and vinyl- I borrowed my best friend's Alphalicious cartridge for the font, and added shadow on some. I (literally) wrapped up the project with some wired ribbon. Pretty simple, once I had the means to cut the wood. Speaking of wood, have any of you seen that Geico commercial with the woodchucks? "Hey you dang woodchucks! You quit chucking my wood!!!"... sorry, I really get a kick out of that. Oh, I found the idea for this project from http://www.howdoesshe.com/- fabulous site!!!

Is it bigger than a breadbox? No, it IS a breadbox!!

I found this breadbox in a thrift store near our house, and it was 2.99, and a lime-ish green. Not particularly shabby, but I knew it had potential. I played around with some paint- a Caribbean blue color, with some crackling and an undercoat of brown paint. I decided it was a bit too bright for me, not to mention the crackling medium was dragging in places and didn't look good. I think the problem was that the paint was too thick. So, I mixed a bottle of the blue with a bottle of white and it was a bit lighter, and then added some water to thin it down enough so I could get full coverage with one stroke of the brush across and not have the brush drag and mess up the crackling medium. On this project, I tried a different brand- Americana weathered wood crackling medium, in which you allow it to dry. I had previously used DecoArt brand crackling medium which requires you to NOT allow it to fully dry. I think I'm just getting aggravated with crackling at this point (at least on bigger projects), but I have figured out that the thickness of the paint used on the top coat can make a big diference in the success of the attempt. I haven't yet tried the spray crackling medium from Valspar- I so want to try it, but it's 6.50 a can and you need a base coat and top coat color, meaning, a little chunk of change for something you've never tried before and not sure what success you'll have with or like. The advantage of the spray would be that you don't have a brush dragging through the medium and smearing it..... Okay, I'm seriously rambling here. So after repainting/crackling the whole thing, I'm happy enough with it to put in my kitchen, but NOT for bread- I'm going to use it for my dish towels. I'm glad I changed out the knob too, those suckers are expensive though! I have a little set of wood drawers that I need to switch 3 knobs out by the time I'm done and I don't want to spend that money on them, and I need smaller knobs.. but I'm digressing again... Anyhow, I think my distressed little breadbox is a happy distressed at this point...