DIY savings bank

while trolling on Pinterest, I saw this Dream Bank at Uncommon Goods and immediately scrounged through my stash to find a shadow box.

By the time school starts in September, my daughter hopes to have saved enough to buy herself a laptop.
I had this shadow box that I picked up a while ago for a few bucks.


I unscrewed the teeny tiny screws at the back with a screwdriver used for eyeglasses. Drilled a slit across the top to insert the money and used some pretty scrapbook paper to line it.

It won’t be easy for her to get her money out, which will hopefully encourage her to continue saving.





I’m going to keep my eye out for more of these. They will make a great gift for any one, whatever their dream is.

DIY clock

I needed a clock for my living room. I decided I should make one. I bought the mechanism, bought a plate, drilled a hole, cut out my vinyl, put it all together.

Build a better bird house

While out junkin’ yesterday, I found this birdhouse for $5.00. Cute, but not substantial enough. I scrounged around the house for something to make it have more presence.  These are the things that I found. You may remember the large candlestick from the table I put together, which I really didn’t like, no matter what I did to it.

I glued all of the pieces together with no more nails, set two cans of paint inside to hold it down and waited.

Then I sprayed it all

I had this little bird in one of my cloches, so I put him on a stick with some fake ivy. Isn’t he adorable?

 

For the top I used part of a pepper mill that I took apart, and added a glass knob

And here it is all put together

 

My few days of vacation are now over, but I still have the weekend to figure out what other junk I can throw together :)

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Junk Trunk

I bought this trunk 12 years ago from a local craftsman. It lived in my old house as a coffee table/toy storage and back then I had the south west theme going on (cringe). One day I decided that it should no longer be stained blue, but should be black, and then I gave up. That was 11 years ago and since then it has sat in my garage, being used as something to practice my piling addiction on. LOL.

I’m warning you, it’s ugly. But it’s a good sturdy piece with dovetailed construction.



I set to work yesterday to make it pretty. It was sanded, then primed with an oil based primer.



I then painted it with 3 coats of Ralph Lauren’s Roadster White. I love this white and use it on most of my signs; It’s creamy without being yellowish.



I wanted something on it that was simple and decided on a damask pattern. I cut out a stencil and applied it to the top and the front. I sanded lightly to make the damask look like it had been on there a long time. Some distressing was done to expose the blue stain underneath the paint.





And now it is a welcome addition to my front entry, providing tons of storage and a place to sit to put on shoes.

I am not a furniture painter by nature, if there is such a beast, and I think there is :)  But I may change my mind after this one because it turned out better than I anticipated.





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PB Teen pillow knock-off

Here is my version of PB Teen Suite Ribbon lumbar pillow.

This is their version

Granted my version was made with bleached drop cloth and my ribbon isn’t quite as thick, but I made mine for nothing, with things I already had. Their version just for the cover is $36.51 Cdn. and the down insert is on sale for $20.15. Um, hello, a cushion for my daughters bed for $56.66, I don’t think so!

Which one would you buy given the choice?  My choice is clear.

Raindrops

I enjoy playing around with this large wall in my living room. It’s an endless source of creativity, figuring out what to display. When I got my grubby little hands on my plum faux fur, I wanted to bring that colour in to the room, but in a subtle way.
I changed the large frame from white to black, then covered a piece of luan with some textured paper.

Using scrapbook paper, I cut out some raindrops and then arranged them in an organic shape.
So for now it works, until I come up with another change.

One Love

After seeing so many great projects using globes, I finally decided what I would do with mine, and jumped on the band wagon.

I picked this up many months ago, but it just sat there, staring at me :)

Are you singing Bob Marley’s song yet? Or maybe Dionne Warwick’s “What the world needs now, is love sweet love”. Let me know :)