Falling Leaves

Just a few days ago, one of my favorite blogs, CENTSATIONAL GIRL, posted a "how-to" on how to make a beautiful collage out of Fall leaves. If you have never visited Kate at Centsational Girl you are in for a treat. She has an eye and the know how to create a gorgeous home using things that you already have and makeing trash into treasure. You have to stop by her blog....it won't be your last visit I guarantee it!

On her blog, Kate, the Centsational Girl, gives you the details on how to create this beautiful and seasonal collage out of the colorful leaves in your backyard. Want to make one for yourself??? Click here on Centsational Girl and you can follow her step by step like I did.

Here is what she made for her own home:

I love this! She actually made a set of two of these beauties. I was quite inspired and I stopped by Hobby Lobby to get the things that I needed. You will need a blank canvas and did you know they make a Metallic Mod Podge? I picked up a jar of silver metallic Mod Podge and some metallic gold and metallic esspresso brown acrylic craft paint. (Kate used a metallic bronze but I couldn't find it so I substituted the espresso instead.) You will also need some leaves and it is best if you press them in a heavy book for a day or two to make sure they are flat.

First step: Paint the canvas. I had some leftover paint....."Latte" from Sherwin Williams that I used to paint my master bathroom earlier this summer. So I used it for the basecoat on my canvas. Wait for it to dry before you start glueing your leaves on the canvas.

Next step: start glueing your leaves on your canvas with the silver metallic Mod Podge. I tried to place my leaves in a scattered fashion on the canvas to make it look like they had landed there after falling out of the tree.

After you have the leaves glued in place then you can start to touch up each of the leaves with some of the metallic gold and espresso or bronze paints. I also used these paints to make strokes and swirls around the leaves to make them look like the wind was moving them. This is fun to do. Keep a damp clean cloth nearby if you are like me and get a bit carried away you can wipe a stroke off the canvas and re-do it if you don't like how a swirl turns out.

And here is the final product. This was a fun project. Thanks Centsational Girl for the How-To and the inspiration. I enjoyed making this one!

Another Decoupaged Masterpiece

As promised I finished my wood box with the hinged lid that was part of my Goodwill junk from earlier in the week. Another reason why I like blogging is that is makes me finish what I started! Anyway, remember this box.....a bit too nautical for me....and you know how I love to decoupage. It was perfect for my next decoupage project and I have lots of black and white papers left over from my last project and there is something about that harlequin pattern that I can't seem to get enough of.

Here it is before....

I gave the box 3 coats of black acrylic craft paint.

The box is indented on the lid and on the front where the pictures of the ships used to be so I cut out two pieces of the black and white harlequin paper to fit each indentation. Then I decoupaged them on by painting Mod Podge in the indentations, painted glue on the back of the paper, and then slowly adhered the paper to the box with a top coat of the Mod Podge.

Next I added another one of the many white porcelain cabinet door knobs that I had left over from when I re-did the cabinet doors in my laundry room. (Click on Laundry Room to take a look at that project.) I had to add a painted matchbox to act as a "washer" for the screw of the knob and it is on the inside of the box helping the knob stay secure. I painted it black to blend in to the inside of the box. I used a drill to get a clean hole in the the center of the top of the box the thread the knob through. This is very similar to the cardboard box that I decoupaged earlier this summer. Click here to take a look at it if you missed it. (Black and White Decoupage Box Project) And that is it.

Here is is before:

And here it is after:

Remember how these all looked when I brought them home from the Goodwill??



And now take a look. Good things come in threes!