EAT String Art

...as in string art that says "EAT" not actually eating string art (but I'm sure you already figured that).

Our poor little, bland, overly neutral apartment has been needing a little spunk. I actually love that the paint is bright white since it helps it feel lighter during the gray rainy months. I'm sure you've seen string art around the internet but I just got around to trying it out. Honestly, I can see why people are hooked on it. It's easy, fast, and pretty fun.

Fortunately I had a scrap board floating around so I didn't need to buy any lumber. All I had to get was a box of nails and some embroidery floss. I chose to use lime, tangerine, and peacock blue so that our lime green Le Creuset pieces that have to be stored in plain sight would tie in with it. First I whitewashed the board using leftover paint from when I did the striped nightstand diluted 50% with water. Then I printed the letters out on the computer and played with the layout.

I'd read other blogs that said making sure the nails didn't line up perfectly gave a better end result so I drew dots where I thought the nails should go and then counted up how many I'd need. This was a needless step however, since I have no idea how many nails are in 0.5 lb and a google search didn't help. I just bought the big box and called it good.

Hammering the nails was a beast - until I decided to pre-drill all the holes. Seriously. That was the best decision ever - and took this project from highly annoying to really fun. These nails are aluminum (only because the others were out of stock and I was too lazy environmentally conscious to drive somewhere else) and did not go in the plywood as easily as normal ones. Plus, I actually really like the white coating. I had planned to put drops of similar colored nail polish on the tops of each nail to make the color pop a little more, but come to realize I like it just the way it is.

It makes the weird white space above our fridge a little more charming. What do you think? Now I'm just a little bummed I have to put the baskets of baking stuff back up there. It's so cute and minimalist this way.

Love to the Moon

My Squirt is now 9, much to my disbelief. She shares a bedroom with her 5 year old step-sister, albeit only part time. I've been trying to revamp things now that she's getting a little bit older but still keep them okey-dokey for a younger child too. Which means the pink and yellow flag bunting we've had up since Squirt was 3 is now coming down. For years it's been all pink all the time, and while pink is still the color of choice for them both, I'm trying to incorporate other colors and make the overall feel a little older. The project of the moment is an art collage wall.

When I saw this on Pinterest (no link attached, the photo was uploaded by user), I knew it was my first endeavor.

 

See, Squirt and I say this all the time. Only we say it in a one-upping kind of way. She'll often say "I love you to PLUTO and back!" 

As usual, I wanted to re-create the idea but use only supplies on hand. I had purchased a three pack of flat 11x14 canvasses at Walmart for somewhere around 6.98 or so and decided to go that route instead of wood. 

To start with, I painted the canvas black and used the Elmer's glue crackle paint technique circulating Pinterest (tutorial here). The only glue I had on hand was Galaxy Glue - which is more of a gel glue filled with glitter. I smeared that all over the black canvas without diluting it. Then, once the glue was tacky (which was almost right away for the gel glue) I brushed a slightly thinned bright blue Art Deco paint over the whole surface. 

I had no idea if it would work but it did! And the best part? The glitter is totally visible and adds the perfect subtle but amazingly awesome amount of bling. LOVE how that turned out and I completely recommend trying it. 

I played around a graphics program to figure out the size of lettering I wanted and printed out the text outline on cardstock, cut it out with an Xacto knife to create a stencil, and then used my favorite craft tool: the Sharpie. Tracing and coloring the letters went really quick. I had toyed with painting it and then lightly sanding the surface (even on the canvas) but decided I didn't want to mar the glitteriness and crackles. Sharpie was fast and perfect for what I was after. 

Which leaves us with this:

At first I lined the stencils up so the spacing between lines was identical and it bugged me. So I moved them to emphasize the "I Love You" a little more. Time will tell if I think that was a good decision since I'm usually anal about spacing :) 

This project was crazy easy (you can tell I did half of it while babysitting!) and I absolutely love how it turned out. Project art wall is well underway!

BeYOUtiful

Last night I got the best compliment in the world. A couple friends told me that I am the most creative person they know. Are you kidding? ME???? Holy cow. Granted, every time they come over my kitchen table is buried deep beneath a pile of project-ness so I can see how the perspective has evolved. I happen to know many people FAR and AWAY more creative than myself. Even still, I jumped up and down, squealed, and told the hubs they just made my entire day.

This blog has been rather lame. Well, lame AND neglected. I couldn't decide what I wanted it to be and in not deciding it became nothing. I've thrown the blog-post-of-the-day topics away and will be documenting my projects instead. That way I don't have to clutter my family blog with all the junk half our family doesn't care about.


You have probably seen ideas around pinterest that use wooden letters on a canvas and then are painted over. I liked that idea. Then you've probably seen the "BeYOUtiful" graphics floating around. I liked that idea too. Add the two together, use only supplies on hand and here's what emerges: new art for my bathroom.

I pulled out some scrap wood and a few packs of Thickers from American Crafts. I liked the shape and the natural feel of the plain chipboard. The black ones were there for brainstorming but I ended up not using them.

The board was already painted and sanded down for a previous project that fell into the "epic fail" department.

See? This is what you see if you look at the back. A lesson in properly sealing the edge of a stencil being painted onto a porous surface.

But back to the project at hand...to make it easy to line up the letter I placed a line of painters tape across the bottom of the board where I wanted the words to be.

Which worked famously, if I do say so myself.

Then a coat of ModPodge (which I actually regret), some drying time, and Voila!

A ten minute project made on my living room bench to artsify my bathroom just a touch.

Ok, now for the regrets: ModPodge tends to pool up around the edges of the letters. I kept brushing it away to keep it thinner but worried that if I kept doing that I'd end up leaving nasty brush strokes in the stuff. I let it dry and now some of the letters have gobs of ModPodge hanging around the edges. I may try to cut out the excess with an exacto knife, or I may just try to convince myself to not be anal. If I were to do it again, I'd use tacky glue on the back of the letters (the adhesive they have just doesn't stick to wood very well) and then spray the whole thing with clear coat when it was dry. Lesson learned.

Either way, I love it, and in it's own way it is beYOUtiful too! :)