The Unveiling of the March Mantel!

Wow, can you believe March is here? February just seemed to fly by, probably because I was busy working on the March mantel which turned into a TOTAL redo!

First, I need to give credit where credit is due, I was so totally inspired by Donna's mantel gate over at Funky Junk Interiors. If you haven't seen it, quick, click this link because her gate is awesome!

Donna at Funky Junk Interiors Awesome Mantel Gate

Did you see hers? And you came back here? I'm honored, because usually I get lost over at her website and forget what I was doing.

Anyway, so all I had to say to my husband were those two sweet little words to get him to help me build a gate. Those sweet little words were "Power Tools."

Let's get this show on the road.  First we took an old pallet we got for free and put it on the back of the truck and began dismantling it:

That's our border collie mix, Gulliver. He wanted to help.

I decided I wanted my gate slats spaced apart and not butted together because I wanted more of an open, airy garden gate, so we spaced them evenly and added the cross bars of the "Z."

Yup, Gulliver is still there. I kept wondering why he was hanging around then saw the dog treat bag up in the truck. Oops!

After we spaced the slats so carefully, I realized we had to flip the whole thing over because I wanted to drill the screws in from the back so you wouldn't see them. Ah well.

After the top and bottom parts were screwed together, we added the middle cross bar.

Okay, confession time, after I took the above picture (by the way, that's hubby's arm), we realized the gate was too tall for above our mantel, so had to disassemble, cut off some more of the length and reassemble again. Measure twice, cut once anyone? Maybe next time.

Then I sloppy painted it with flat white paint. I wanted some of the natural wood showing through so didn't put too many coats of paint on.

After that I sanded the gate in spots to make it look more worn. Especially the upper right "grab to open" area.

See? Doesn't it look like we've been grabbing that corner of the gate for years to open it? After I was done sanding I added some gate hinges on the left side of the gate.

Time for the reveal! I found some barbed wire in my husbands shop area and took a metal star I've had for a while and decorated the front of the gate.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!

For the rest of the mantel, I added a few pieces from my white enamelware collection and also some homemade finials I made (tutorial on those later this month).

Of course, I needed to work a bird in there, so a nest with a small ceramic bird sits on top of one of my enamelware buckets.

Homemade finials with a cow that was given to me by a friend a few years ago.

Now the mantel in its entirety:

My picture this month is just a silly shot of the 3 of us that I had printed in sepia.

Now the best part, my total cost this month was $14.50!

$3.00 for the flowers (1/2 price coupon at Dollar General), $5 for the gate hardware, $5 for the white paint and $1.50 for what I made the finials out of. Woo hoo! Under budget! Everything else I already had.

Thanks for looking!

Until next time,

3/7/11 update. Just found out that Linda over at Coastal Charm featured my mantel gate.  Wow! Thanks, Linda!

Linking to these fun and fabulous linky parties:

• Coastal Charm
• Krafty Kat
• The Stories of A2Z
• Faded Charm Cottage
• The Shappy Chic Cottage
• Beyond the Picket Fence - Under $100
• Chic on a Shoestring
• Funky Junk Interiors - Saturday Night Special
• Tatertots and Jello - Weekend Wrap Party
• DIY Home Sweet Home Project
• C.R.A.F.T.
• Fingerprints on the Fridge

Halloween Block Calendar

Hey! Pssst, over here! Yes, yes, it's me! Whew! It's kinda dusty in here isn't it? Cobwebs on the keyboard, stuff like that. Well, all in keeping with the Halloween theme, right? Again, a while since I've blogged. Arrgghh!

Anyway, thank goodness for obscure banking holidays. Yay for Columbus! Because of him, I had the day off yesterday and was able to . . . craft!

So, getting back out that trusty (and dusty) box of blocks and surfing various craft blogs here's what I did (thank you to How Does She website for the tutorial!). I decided to make mine a calendar block instead of a countdown like the tutorial shows.

First, I raided my stash for the proper size blocks. See, this is why I kept my sons chewed and drooled upon baby blocks instead of throwing them away, I knew they'd come in handy one day. Or sometimes you can find these at thrift stores or flea markets. Snag 'em! I'm telling ya! They are perfect for this! People might look at you funny and go "Ewww, someone else's kid had those in his/her mouth!" But bleach is your friend, and you know what a cute craft project it would turn into right?

Here's the scenario (you at the flea market):

"How much for those baby blocks?"

"$2.00"

"Um, how about 50 cents? They're kind of worn out."

"Sure, I never thought anyone would buy them, they're yours for 50 cents."
(snickers and points at you as you are walking away)

Then you go home and bleach off Junior's drool and all the other crafters will have craft envy over your score of wooden blocks!

So first, I sanded down the blocks a little then raided hubby's spray paint stash for a can of black and spray painted the blocks black:

After they dried (that's always the hard part for me, waiting for stuff to dry as I'm always anxious to go on to the next step). Anyway, after they were not quite dry I sanded the edges because I like stuff distress-y looking:

Then I cut three different designs of scrapbook paper to the sizes needed to cover each side of the small blocks and the front of the larger block. I inked all the edges of the paper squares black then modge podged them to the blocks:

Let dry . . . tap tap tap <---impatient fingers drumming on craft table.

Then I cut out the word "October" and the numbers for the blocks with my Cricut and adhered those to the blocks. On the first block you put the numbers 1, 2, 6, 0, 7, 8 and on the second block the numbers 1, 4, 3, 5, 2, 0.  I just followed instructions there that some other crafter had already figured out. If I had to sit and figure out the numbers I probably would still be at my craft table . . . buy hey, at least everything would be dry, right?  BTW, the 6 doubles as the 9 (flip it over).

Anyway, then I coated everything with modge podge, I love MoPo!

Let dry . . . pop, pop, pop <----entertaining self making fish noises with cheeks and lips.

Then I put it together and tied it with a spooky ribbon:

Isn't it adorable? I like it so much I think I'm going to do one for November with Thanksgiving papers!

Linked to these parties: All Thingz Related, Favorite Things Friday, Funky Junk Sat Nite Special, A Vison to Remember. Polish the Stars Halloween Link Party, While He Was Napping, I Heart Naptime

Photo Holder Blocks

Remember me? No? Really? Sigh! Okay then, I'll refresh your memory, the gal in the Smokies who updates her blog every blue moon, yes, that one!

Well, seems as though everything comes to an end at once around here, school, soccer, scouts. Hey, I just noticed all our extracurricular activies start with an "S"!  Hmmm, you don't seem as excited about that as me. Okay, I'm a dork.

I talked my husband into holding the end of season soccer party at our house (eek!) and so I wanted to make a gift for each kid on our soccer team. I've been wanting to make photo blocks for quite some time so I sat down the morning of the party (because I just love giving myself plenty of time to do things . . . snort!) and started.

My dad had supplied me with the wood (I asked him to save me his scraps, and showed up at their house one day and he handed me this box, hammer not included):

So I took out 8 blocks and painted half of them blue, half of them red. Since our soccer party was on Memorial Day weekend, I wanted to keep it a red, white and blue theme to celebrate.

My husband shaped the wire holders for me. He put a dowel rod in his vice grip and wrapped the wire around it to make the circle part. I got a major eye roll from him when I mentioned we were crafting together and gee wasn't this fun! I should have taken more pictures, but I was in a hurry to get these done because someone gets ideas in her head to do stuff like this at the last minute (who, me?).

The wire thingies, well, yes, they stuck to the paper. Hubby then stuck them straight up in styrofoam for me to paint, dang that man is smart. It worked much better that way (can you picture it?).

After the blocks sorta dried I sanded the edges of them with really rough sand paper. Not only did this smooth the edges of the wood, it gave that rustic look I wanted.

Then I brought them back to hubs, batted my lashes and asked him to drill holes in the top for the wire holder part to stick into the wood (behind every crafter is a man with power tools).

Then I went inside to my craft table, and cut scrap paper squares the size of the blocks. I matted the patterned paper on solid paper to frame it, then cut a monogram with my cricut, glued that to the scrap paper square and modge podged the whole thing to the block. The girls got floral paper, the boys got stripes.

Here is my son holding the finished product:

Isn't he and it cute? The modge podge hadn't really dried all the way when I took that picture. Oops.

Each picture holder got an action shot front and back picture of the kids during their game.

Voila! Done! And everyone loved them!

Until next time!