“Pin-spiration” {Pinterest +inspiration }

I have a Pinterest addict for several months now and have inspired to do many projects that I have found. This is my first
documented Pinspiration. I saw several handpainted stenciled wall tutorials that left me itching to do. Since we recently played musical bedrooms at my house
my husband and I moved to my oldest sons bedroom and our old office as our new bedrooms. Previously his room was a very dark navy and ours was offwhite and pale pink.
I wanted to change it up and found a glorious pale grey paint in Home Depots OOPS! part of the paint department. I loved the color but it needed some oomph. Thats where
the handpainted trellis design came into play. For this I used Martha Stewarts mother of pearl craft paint. It only took one bottle for the whole wall! I started out using my cardboard stencil and penciling in the design then painting it in. However the paint I used was sheer and showed the pencil marks and because the paint went
over the pencil I could not erase some parts..gggrr. Good thing I only did this on part of the wall. For the rest I held my cardboard stencil on the wall and painted around the template as the guide. Not only did it avoid the pencil dilemma but the found the design came out better with a guide rather than freehand following the pencil. Below are some pics of my bedroom wall, due note that the paint overlay is a sheer pearl and looks stronger and more solid from the flash. Click on images to enlarge =)

Here are several of the “Pin-spirations” and their links.

The link to the downloadable and printable template I used can be found
here

I still have to accesorize the room and bed but the wall is my jumping point. I also made the headboard shown here from a roadside find screen. I
will be doing a post about that project as well. In the picture it is shown will only the base lined cover. I intend to make a slipcover for it and possibly tuft it…tune in for that one soon.

Clearance Shopping: thinking outside the box

One of my favorite places to shop in any store is the clearance section. Not only do I love a great deal but I find myself thinking more creatively about the items, possibly the idea of not letting a good bargain pass me by. All too often I see something and have thought “O great price, but what am I going to do with it?” only later to have an “Aha!” moment of how the item would have been perfect for something. So when doing any shopping , particularly clearance, I mentally dissect the items as to their possibilities not just what their intended purpose is. Most recently I picked up a bunch of Christmas picks ( picked picks…pun intended ) at Michaels arts and crafts for 80% off, making them roughly 20 cents a pick. When I was shopping I wasn’t thinking Christmas picks I was looking at their colors…they were available in a veritable RAINBOW of colors. Here is some pictures of my haul:

The swirly ones are a gorgeous dark green, perfect for St Patricks Day.

I got an assortment of red, white and blue picks to use for valentines day, labor day, fourth of july and memorial day.

These long glittery picks with stars are perfect for fourth of july! Love these.

Here are some more fourth of july colored picks, to me they look like fireworks.

As you can see Christmas Picks are not just for Christmas! So when I shop I think colors.
Red= christmas , fourth of july, memorial day, labor day, valentines day , thanksgiving
white= any holiday really
green= christmas, St Patricks day, halloween and autumn/thanksgiving ( or as I say falloween)
blue= fourth of july, memorial day, labor day , boys birthdays/showers/christenings etc
orange= falloween
black= falloween
pastels= easter, baby birthdays/showers/christenings
You get the idea…you can get more mileage out of you festive decor.

Pumpkin Initial Frame

Quick and easy projects from freebie items always make me smile. This “pump-tas-tic” initial frame is no exception.
I scored this never used round brass frame from a freebie tag sale leftover rummage.

Great condition , but brass. Not my style. It was a nice dimunitive (fancy smancy word for small) size for an accent. Being autumn my initial thought was PUMPKIN with an initial (pun intended). I spray painted the frame
a dark burgandy then orange. I sanded the paint slightly to reveal the burgandy underneath. I thought the plain orange was well too plain. I added a piece of decorative scrapbook paper inside and a scrapbook sticker for my initial. To further pumpkin-fy my frame I used green floral wire wrapped around a screwdriver to make my pumpkin tendrils.

I then added a piece of floral tape rolled up as my stump. It is slightly tacky so I just used its own tackiness to adhere it to the frame. I also added a couple of scrapbook sticker leaves as well. Now it sits on a shelf with my DIY Halloween poison bottles. I will be blogging about how to DIY on those soon as well.

Striped Tapers

I love love love these striped candles

by Ana available here . However
the $24 per pair price tag, well not so much. Being the instant gratification cheapskate that I am I came up with
these.

I have them place in milkglass bud vases as they were short tapers. All I did was blue tape my candles and spraypainted them. **Note that because the candles are of course wax, the paint takes longer to dry than normal drying time of spray paint.Here is my taped of candles

and here are my tapers set up to dry (please overlook my messy workstation in my cellar )

Considering that my candles were less than a dollar VS. $24 I am quite pleased with meself…..O the color posiblities.

It’s that time of year…

The leaves are turning, the air is cooling and it’s time to start Fall-i-fying my home. As much as I love love love summer I do adore falloween decorating. Here are some pics I took of acorns from my backyard that along with the turning of the leaves is a sign to kick off autumn.

Let the Fall-o-ween decorating begin!

I have been pinned!

I just joined a site called Pinterest . It is a virtual bulletinboard where
people “pin” up blog inspirations. Like virtual magazine clippings. I was checking out The White Bench blog and she had been pinned and showed how you can see if your blog has been pinned. On a lark I tried it and ..HA! I had been pinned. I must say I was pleasantly surprised and honored.
You can see if you blog has been pinned by putting the following in your address bar but be sure to type in your blog addy instead of mine.

http://pinterest.com/source/themermaidstale.wordpress.com/

Have you been pinned?

From recycling bin to pendant

As I was about to toss my empty blush container into the recyclcling bin I had an aha moment. As I looked
at the container more closely I realized that the empty metal tray could be used as a pendant blank. I removed the metal tray (also the small mirror for a later craft project), I , cleaned both of them up. I then filled the pendant tray with tiny glass rocks and covered them with clear glaze resin. Once dried I added a pendant bail and attached it to a necklace and Voila! I admit my pictures are not great as I can craft up a storm but taking good pictures seems to elude me. You can fill your tray with picture images or tiny shells as well, let your imagination run wild. Enjoy!

Mini Blinds repurposed-upcycled

Mini blinds, mini blinds , mini blinds….they were all the rage in the 90′s, everyone had them including me. However
I quickly found them quite the nusiance as they broke easily , either a blind strip would break and hang open to a gap or
more often than not if you had children or pets you would stumble upon a scene like this one:

And let us not forget how dang time consuming to clean!!!! But alas comes some fun and clever re-uses for the plastic slats. I have been using them for years as plant tags like this picture

from CraftingGreenWorld.Com. They work great with a sharpie and are waterproof , so they work perfect outdoors too!

I found more inspirational uses shown below from ApartmentThereapy.com

You can weave them to make placemats and runners. I just love the adorable picket fence idea too! If you have clever repurposing ideas I’d love to know…=)

Simply “Charm”ing…and cheap!

Here is a project I love…easy,cheap and uses readily availble items. These are charms I made out of
scrap paper, metal wedding rings (you know the kind used for wedding favors that you get in bulk and super cheap!)and glossy accents dimensional liquid. You can substitute the glossy accents for clear embossing powder as well which works better for magazine paper. Here are the some finished charms I did:

So simple and pretty. All the supplies I used were:

*metal wedding rings

*packing tape (or blue painters tape, any low tack tape)

*glossy accents demensional embellishment (clear embossing powder can be used as well)

*scissors (or same size hole punch, circle cutter or exacto knife)

*image on paper ( I used a handout that came in my house beautiful subscription request, I just loved the roses on it and
it was a heavy cardstock paper, but you can use magazine images, pictures, scrap paper ..anything paper)

*straight pin & vaseline

*jump rings

The Glossy Accents clear dimensional embellishment is widely available at craft stores in the scrapbook section. It comes in clear and crackle finish. You can substitute with clear embossing powder also available in the scrapbook section.

I used metal wedding rings shown here that are available in the wedding section of craft stores. They come in bulk ,silver or gold and are super cheap. They have a nice floral raised design as well that make for a nice finishing detail. They are also bendable as you can tinker with making different shaps like teardrop or ovals.

Here is the House Beautiful ad I used.
Then I placed my ring on the part of the image I wanted and drew on the inside of the ring and then cutout the image.

Next I placed the ring on the tacky side of packing tape and inserted my image inside, you will need to glue the images to gether image side out if you are not using a double sided image as both sides show in the charm.

Next I used a straight pin to punch a hole for the jump ring later.

Here I then filled the disc with the dimensional liquid, it is cloudy but dries crystal clear.

Here I placed the straight pin in the hole for the jump ring, I put a thin layer of vaseline on the pin beforehand, this is to keep the liquid from drying adhered to the pin. I also repeatedly spun the pin while the liquid dried so that it would not stick. Even if you liquid sticks it is not too strong and you can pull out the pin without damaging the final charm. It takes roughly 1 hour or more depending on the weathers heat and humidity in your area.

Once dry, pull out the pin and repeat the liquid on the other side. Finally adding your jump ring. Voila, simple , charming and cheap!

Marvelous Mondays

Most people abhor mondays, however I am not most people. Mondays for me are 2 tickets 50% off sale at my favorite thrift shop. Today I was thrilled when I stumbled upon an antique demijohn. For those not familiar with that name I am sure you have seen them in decorating magazines, especially country living or at flea markets. They are those HUGE green glass wine jugs/jars either plain or with the original wood and wicker covering. I often oogle them in magazines and at flea markets but their price tag between $100 to $200 and up I simply oogle and pass them up. Today I oogled and purchased! The original mouthblown jar is at least 5 gallons, wood and wicker covering and handmade wood stopper. It even has the original straw “padding” inside. The best part was that it was only $10.00!!!! I swooped in and grabbed it, luckily because another woman had seen it and was going toward it. She followed me around the store I presume hoping I would change my mind and put it down. But nope it came home with me along with the huge smile on my face that it gave me. Here are my pics: