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I don’t remember where I got those faux tulips, but I love the color and the quality. I’ve had the cut glass vase forever. I made the wired rope heart earlier this week and love it so much I’m keeping it. Lol
The fireplace garland I made last year. I leave the greenery and the yarn hearts and pom pom garland up all year and just add to it each season.
I found the Valentine screensaver on YouTube. So many cool TV art screensavers on YouTube. Just do a search for TV art and you will find all kinds. Since my mantle is so close to my TV, I found the screensavers do a good job of decorating my mantle area.
Simple, but inviting. This screensaver plays relaxing music and several different images. So relaxing! But not for long. We are headed to a couple of our booths for some makeovers in a few minutes.
We’ve been working on an Art Deco dresser. Danny has taken it all apart and is rebuilding it. It is going to be beautiful! The detail is so pretty! But the drawer pulls are spectacular! They were so worn and discolored but still all in one piece. The red Bakelite inserts are in perfect shape and by themselves are valuable. I cleaned them, scrubbed them with Bar Keepers Friend, then waxed them and applied gold leaf RubnBuff. They are amazing!
The dresser had been painted in an earlier life. The only thing now is to decide what color to paint it. My thought right now is to paint it a bluish green color with our Missouri Limestone Paint Company chalk paint color we named “Something Blue”. Then highlight the details on the front, the trim on the back of the top, and the feet with gold leaf RubnBuff.
A friend saw the picture I posted of a gnome I made a couple of years ago and wanted one, do I crocheted a hat, body covering, and boots for it in her favorite color – purple. A Dollar Tree mop head became his beard.
I hot glued the body covering over a large water glass with lid from Dollar Tree. I made wood forms for his feet and stuck them in the crocheted boots I made and glued them to the lid of the glass, using hot glue and super glue. Then added more hot glue all around the wood.
I cut the strands off the mop head and applied two layers of them all around the edge of the glass bottom. Then hot glued the hat on and added a wood nose. He stands about 12” high.
Gnomes are still popular. Anytime I make one, it sells quickly. So the other day, a friend sent me a link for making one around a wooden ring with the hat being created with yarn around a piece of toilet paper holder. So, of course I had to make one. My ring was a little bigger so I improvised and added purple yarn around it and glued the hat to the ring. I added a little pink heart. I also glued the whole thing to a Dollar Tree stand up frame to display him.
My purple loving friend bought him, too. 🙂
Here’s the link to the original pattern. https://www.itsalwaysautumn.com/easy-macrame-gnomes.html
Still busy creating so I haven’t had time to post how we did some of these projects. Here they are, though, for inspiration for you.
This is a vignette I put together for winter decor. I had a Christmas transfer on one side of this pitcher and a winter one on the other. I turned it around and added some branches from a tree in my yard then added lights. I made the snowman last year and added the Winter sign I’ve had for a long time.
Danny cut this cute gnome out of a scrap piece of plywood, drew the details and painted and sealed him. He added some stakes so we can put him in the pot’s dirt.
I crocheted another bunch of hats to sell to a friend’s daughter. She adds them to the baskets of herbal remedies she sells.
And more crochet… which begat more crochet that I’m still working on. I made a couple of gnome towel rings. I had made some boho type ones for a couple of friends and then decided to find a pattern for making more. I’ve sold 10 so far of them.
And then I saw a post for a group called Random Acts of Crochet Kindness and cute little worry worms to make and spread around town so I had to make some of those. I plan on making more later on. But I figured out a way to make a cute Valentine one for kids and ended up with 86 orders. Still working on those.
Then my cousin sent me a video of someone crocheting a woven heart. I had to find the tutorial and make one. Then I saw a video on making a heart with wine corks so I had to do that, too. And then someone else told me about decoupaging on a candle with wax paper. Yep! I had to do that, too. I’ve used the hot iron method with parchment paper before, but not on a candle. Worked like a charm. And the little tag- I wrote love on it with a s or h marker and burned it and then painted it. That worked, too.
Whew! I’m getting tired just typing all we’ve done so far this month. But wait! There’s more!
And then came a couple of jewelry boxes. I have a huge stash of them but haven’t painted any in awhile. These sold quickly so plan on painting ring more soon.
I saw an idea for a date night jar on Pinterest. This is my version. Jar from Dollar Tree. I painted the glass lid. If you spray glass with a clear sealer first, chalk paint will adhere well.
I don’t have staged pics of this beautiful library table. It is going to one of our booths this week. Danny sanded the top. I stained it with a w at teenaged stain. It has five coats of Varathane Crystal Clear Water based polyurethane in matte finish. The rest is painted with our Missouri Limestone Paint Company “Cupboard Green” and sealed. I love how it turned out.
Danny created this white washed hanging rack from a vintage ladder.
Another project is this gorgeous half table console. This is a long description but hopefully will inspire those who like boho with some ideas. I think this is one of my most favorite projects ever. I had so much fun with it.
We’ve had this table (and matching lamps) since soon after we built our house in 1985. Holy cow! That was 38 years ago!! The other day, I decided we didn’t need them anymore so decided to paint them. Danny suggested painting the top with our Missouri Limestone Paint Company “Bourbon Street”, a dark teal color. I thought Rustoleum metallic gold on the metal legs would look good with the teal. I also painted the metal on the lamps with it. They all turned out gorgeous!
Then, when I showed the table to a friend, she said I should style it as a boho piece. I agreed.
So pretty much all day today, I have been creating items for it to sell from things I have in my supplies:
1) Picture frame: gifted by a neighbor- funny thing, my mom had our pictures in frames almost exactly like this growing up. The back is velvet. It can still stand up, but it makes a great tray, too. This frame is old!
2) This awesome fabric which was once valances with bead trim, was gifted by a friend. I’ve already used it as a curtain, as you can see, to hide Danny’s power tools and to create a little boho hanging. Lol I simply put a piece of the fabric under the glass of the picture frame for an instant boho tray!
3) A bowl of boho goodness. I had all the ingredients including this cute wood bowl I thrifted. I just added the beads around it for a true boho style. It took me a good bit to figure out how to do it to look finished, then decided to rip it out (it was sewn in with nylon thread). But when I got it all out, it was attached to this beautiful piece of fabric tape in this awesome color! I just hot glued it around the bowl!
4) Picture frame: gifted by the same neighbor: I did a line drawing on the glass of similar leaves in the table and put a piece of scrapbook paper behind it in a coordinating color and now have a boho print!
5) Bottle of peacock feathers: the bottle I think came with fragrance oil and bamboo sticks at some point. I did paint the lid that sits around it metallic gold this morning. I’m pretty sure I picked up the peacock feathers at a yard sale.
And then, we came up with a few more boho accessories.
And when we found this mirror shopping, we knew we had to get it! Danny painstakingly covered all the mirrors. I painted it metallic gold and then he removed all the tape. I cleaned it and….it is just stunning!
We also found this cute little kid’s drawing table. We added a couple of stools to it and took it to our booth at Sweet Repeats in Sullivan.
The wood base on this candle holder is a bed riser I turned upside down and painted. the dish for the candle is a vintage ashtray.
Coming up…. Danny is working on a new project. We are busy figuring out a way to make a table top for it. Stay tuned!
You probably wouldn’t want to use both lamps on the table, but maybe in the same room would be perfect!
I’ve been so busy crafting, I haven’t been posting lately. So doing a photo dump here of many of the projects I, or my husband and I, have been working on lately.
You will find details on some of these projects by following my Instagram page. I try to explain there on how some of them were created. https://instagram.com/sharsumpaint
For now, I have to go clean and reorganize my craft area before Christmas. Wish me luck!
Update: Jan. 12, 2023
It seems Christmas got in the way and every time I sat down to try to add photos, I couldn’t. But, I did get my craft area cleaned and organized! I finally figured out that I was missing permissions for WordPress to access my photos. Most of the projects are on Instagram, but here’s few of my favorites. Maybe you can save some ideas for next year.
The oak dresser we’ve had for several years in storage is now refurbished. When we bought it, the base literally fell apart as we were loading it, but that mirror was so worth all the work it was going to take to bring it back to life. The mirror is beveled and has just a bit of aged patina.
Researching it, we found the company Estey Furniture produced it in the late 1800s or early 1900s. The original handles were a bail type handle, but were replaced at some point by these Depression knobs from the 1930s.
Danny took the dresser completely apart. He loaded the base into our SUV and took it to a grands babysitting gig and stripped it. A few weeks ago, he loaded it again and when we were babysitting another grand in another city, sanded it, and put it back together.
We had completely forgotten what the mirror looked like. Wow! It changed my whole idea of how I wanted to refinish it. I decided a whitewash look would bring out the grain detail and take away the orangeish look oak raw oak sometimes has. The drawers were not pretty on the inside and sides so I stained the insides and stenciled a pattern on the outside.
This is the difference between the whitewashed look and raw wood after stripping and sanding. After whitewashing everything, I gave the base and mirror 3 coats of water-based Crystal clear Varathane Polyurethane in satin finish and 5 coats on the top of the dresser.
I couldn’t wait to take pics. I used an app called ProKnockOut to remove the mirror reflection and change it out to a new image of a bedroom I found on pixels.com and to cut out the dresser itself and to apply a plain background.
It already has a new home. This piece ranks right up there as one of my favorite pieces we have ever refurbished.
One more little craft, then taking a short break for our 50th anniversary coming up on the 28th! Hoping to see some beautiful fall foliage and an eagle 🦅 or two.
We found a bunch of these cedar rounds thrifting.
I’ve already made a snowman’s hat, a stand for my teeny tiny snowmen, and now I’ve used one for a small 5” high cedar tree.
I had these faux cedar pieces I bought after Christmas last year. They were attached to a table runner. 🙂 And… since these are cedar rounds, I thought why not make it an air freshener, too? I just happen to have Young Living’s Cedarwood essential oil to use on it. 🙂
I love the smell of this Cedarwood. P.S. It freshens up furniture drawers, too! I think I will put a couple of the rounds with a drop of Cedarwood in the dresser I just finished!
I had such fun making my 8” tall jute tree https://sharsumpaint.com/2022/10/17/spiral-jute-rope-christmas-tree/, I had to make a smaller one this morning.
I changed it up a little. This one is 5” tall. I used a small 2 1/4” wood slice for the base and cut down the size of the skewer some. It still has a point on it for piercing each strand of jute. I just cut it off at the end.
The jute pieces I used:
12 – 4”
12 – 3”
12 – 2”
2 – 1”
And a half inch piece. For this one I used more glue and pressed and molded it to round off the top.
I cut off the skewer and left enough to glue the greenery and the star to the skewer and glued some jute to the back of it to cover.
This one got caught in a snow storm so has a bit of snow (paint) on the branches.
This is why I seem to never get anything other than crafting done. Lol
I made this Olaf out of wood slices last year and still had him. One of my favorite enablers, sent me this inspiration Olaf this morning.
I knew I could adapt him to hold up his head with his little arms after he lost it, so I did. Lol
My Olaf now belongs to her. 🤪