Love Canvas...Just in time for Valentine's decorating

I love to decorate my front door for every season.  I actually love to decorate my entire front porch for each holiday or each season but if I'm being completely honest, my front porch decor is only changed about twice a year.  (My pumpkins from October JUST made it to the trash can.  Any one relate?) :)  But, I can usually make the door decorations without any delay.  Here's my door decor for Valentine's Day.

I started with chipboard letters that I found at Hobby Lobby for $1.99 each (plus 50% off!!).

Since I was going to glue paper on top of these letters, I painted the edges.  I didn't want the brown color to show from the side.

I traced the letters with this fun paper I found in the Christmas clearance at Michael's over the weekend.  Tip: be sure that you are tracing with the paper facing up and the letter facing up or you will have a backwards letter to glue on...not that I've ever done anything like that....three times in a row.  Then, I used a foam brush and Mod Podge to glue the paper to the letter.  This particular paper is thin and metallic so it went on incredibly smoothly.  Love that.

This is my canvas before I glued my letters on.  I initially painted the whole think hot pink.  Then, I attempted to crackle it with little luck.  I've got to keep practicing my crackling skills because I've only gotten it right once.  This was not one of those times.  I messed it up and it created a texture more than a crackle.  So, I painted over it with three more coats of white and used a one step crackly.  This is the end result.  Not too bad, eh?  I live in the school of "keep going until you get what you want or until your project is completely ruined." :)

Here is the final project.  I used E6000 to glue my letters to my canvas.  I have a couple of tips on doing that.  First, I put two 8x10 canvases under my 16x20 to make a hard surface.  Then, I put a couple of wood blocks on top of my letters so they would adhere nicely.  Worked great.  I also added a bow to the bottom of my canvas for an extra little embellishment.  (My darling husband got me the most precious blanket from Pottery Barn for Christmas and he had it wrapped in the store.  They used this ribbon on the package and I salvaged it out of the trash on Christmas morning because I just KNEW that I would be able to find a project to use it for.)  Enjoy!

Reverse Vinyl Wall Art

I have a black and white wall in my bedroom.  It is full of stuff that I have made that represent my husband and myself.  I had a space that I needed to fill and I had a frame that fit the space perfectly.  I didn't want to use a frame, though.  I already have several frames in the area.  I had an idea to use my Cricut and print something on a canvas.

I went to my craft closet to grab a canvas but I didn't have one.  I did, however, have this piece of mdf that was once the backing of a frame that I used in a different project.  It fit my space perfectly.  So exciting!  I love using otherwise useless stuff.

I found this lovely book while on vacation in Mustang Island, Texas.  It was in a souvenir shop on the beach and it was old, old, old.  I knew it would be perfect for a project someday and snagged it up for only a quarter!  Bonus!!

I used my decopage medium and glued the pages down in a random fashion.  Then, I used my Cricut and cut out our wedding date and stuck it to my board.

Then, I painted over the entire thing.  Once it was dry, I peeled the vinyl off and had my lovely piece of art.  I lightly sanded the entire thing and sanded a little rougher on the edges to give it more of a distressed look.

I love the final result.

A new twist on mosaic DIY art

I have recently been looking for some kind of art piece for my bedroom that would bring all of the colors of the room together in one place.  I decided to do a mosaic but I just was not in love with the square ones.  Then, I had an idea.  I LOVE that glass tile that people use on their kitchen back splashes.  And I love the long, log shaped ones.  So, I decided to to a mosaic using that pattern, except I kept mine aligned for a cleaner look.  I thought that would look better since I was using such a wide variety of colors.  I love the way it turned out.

 

 I should have done a step by step and I seriously thought about it, but then I figured everyone knows how to do this.  If not, I will briefly explain.  If you need a more detailed explanation, you can search Google or Pinterest for mosaic art and find some really great tutes.

1.  Purchase MDF in size and thickness you desire.  TIP: MDF is heavy so make sure you are able to anchor it properly to the wall if you are going to hang it.

2.  Prime MDF.  Necessary step.  You could also use canvas but MDF is much cheaper and you can really press down on it when you are mounting your pieces.  Plus, you can have it cut down to any size you want at Home Depot or Lowe's for only .25 per cut.  Bonus! 

3.  Paint MDF.  I used spray paint because I'm impatient and it dries in no time. :)

4.  Assemble color chips.  I used paint chips because I have never thrown one away and had a trillion.  You could also use scrapbooking paper, or paint your own water colors and use those.

5.  Cut chips to desired size.  My canvas is 24x30 and I knew I wanted to have a 2x2 inch border all the way around so I cut my strips 1x4 inches and used 26 rows of 5.  FYI: this took me quite a while.  It's tedious, but you MUST make sure that all of your pieces are EXACTLY the same size.  If not, it will cause trouble in the end.

6.  You could lay your chips out, but I just went for it.  I wanted a really random look so I put the same colors together sometimes...makes it seem more accidental.  I used a glue/water mixture.  50% school glue and 50% water.  I brushed the back of each of the rectangles with my mixture and stuck it down to the board.  I went in rows across until I reached 5 and then went to the next one.

7.  Once I had all of the pieces down, I used my homemade Mod Podge mixture and coated the entire thing.

8.  When that had dried, I wiped the whole thing down with a small bit of stain to give it a little more of an aged look.