Sweet Summer lamp

In the dusk of the day, when the sun starts to set you'll find me here, out on my deck.

I love my gazebo in the summer. And now, I'm loving it even more.  I found this stunning lampshade frame at a salvage store while shopping with my honey this weekend.  It's so graceful and curvy, I just had to have it.  It was just the frame when I brought it home, and in my excitement to start making it look prettier, I didn't get a before picture.  You will just have to imagine it - nakedヅ.  I wrapped on some muslin and tied on some old fabric, then I attached some little grapevine balls I had around from an old light fixture.  Using wire, I attached them at different lengths, and added a strand of lights. 

 I took down our old light fixture that came with the gazebo and hung this in it's place.  There used to be a canopy on the gazebo, but it ripped in the wind.  We had to take it off about a month ago since it was just flapping around.  Then in a tragic turn of events, Kohls decided to no longer sell replacement canopies.  I freaked out for a few weeks, stalking their website hoping they would get more in.  I really didn't want to have to buy a whole new unit just for the canopy! Finally, thanks to the wonder of the internet, I found a place that makes replacement canopies for all the store brands - genius!  I ordered a replacement and am expecting it this week.  Then I can once more close up the screenhouse and bask in my new light fixture.  ahhhh now where is my wine?

                                            


                                        

Burlap stars

Today I'm sharing one of my favorite crafts that I made last year for the 4TH of July.  I'm not big into  decorating for the 4TH, but saw something similar in a little specialty store and fell in love with the look, but couldn't bring myself to pay $45 for it.  

I started with a piece of burlap and cut a star stencil out of newspaper.  After I cut out 2 identical stars, I used acrylic and puffy paints and created my designs.  Once that dried, I glued the two stars together with a hot glue gun, leaving a side open to stuff with newspaper.  It's important to leave a large enough hole because it is difficult to stuff the star so that it lays nicely when you only have a little hole to work with.  Once I was happy with it, I glued the last side shut.  I then took a piece of wire, added some beads, buttons, and other flare to jazz up the metal wire a bit.  Both of these stars are still gracing my front porch right now, and I still love them!  The total cost of the project was $7, and I had enough burlap to make 4 stars. So that really was less than $2 a piece to make. Happy Fireworks to you!!

Linky Party@ All-things-burlap

It's Summertime!

This was a quick little project that literally took me all of 4 minutes.  In the spring I had made a cute little Springtime frame.  I decided with school almost out, it was officially time to say hello to summer.  I added a new layer of burlap, and tucked the Spring one behind the picture so next year I can pull it out and use it again.  This was so simple!  Writing this post took longer!  Enjoy the lazy days of summer!

saw - to - sign

A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to find out about a really cool barn party(Michele you rock!).  Located on the back roads of Milford, it's a really neat little place is called The Pink Promenade. It's two sisters collecting and creating fascinating things and then sharing them with us. I say "us" because I now consider myself one of the "in crowd". OK, I've been there once, and although I had the pleasure of meeting one of the sisters, she probably doesn't even remember me, even though I want to be her new best friend and come over, hang out and do cool things too.  But since I don't want her ordering up a restraining order on me before we even start hanging out I will move on.


Here's a link to their site:  http://pinkpromenade.blogspot.com/  And yes the barn WAS PINK!!


So much goodness was there that day.  I brought along my husband and 9 year old son because we were on our way to go canoeing.  Although they were the only men there, they actually both loved the place!  There were so many interesting things to look at.  We ended up buying a bird house made out of recycled tins, but my husband gets the credit for finding an old lumberjack saw (see honey I do give you some credit).  It's about 6 feet long and rusted. The handles are missing, which made it the perfect accessory for our basement.  It matches perfectly with our barn wood and rustic decor and was the perfect length to hang above the TV.

 long isn't it?

Once hung, we realized it needed a little something more.  So we decided to stencil on a saying, giving it some more character.  Out came the paint and 10 minutes later it was done, and back on the wall.

If you would like to see more of the basement click here: http://giraffe-legs.blogspot.com/2012/01/finishing-basement.html

A perfect edition!  Good eye honey! SWAK!

Teacher Thank you gift in Ball jar

Here's a simple little gift that would be fun to receive.  I took a Ball jar and painted the inside a pale blue using acrylic paint.  After it dried I created a soft pillow with some polyfil.  Inside I placed a darling hand stamped necklace ordered from www.jessicabe.etsy.com  

I then wrapped the lid in blue baker's twine and attached a note card for the teacher along with the business card of where I ordered the necklace. A flower embellishment to the lid finished it all off.

I think it's simply divine. : )