I just love our guest house porch. I am thrilled with the swing and rocker. I am crazy about the door to the house and am looking forward to our wood plank porch ceiling. The one thing I didn’t like was looking directly at a blank wall while on the swing.
I have wanted to make a barn quilt for a while and the blank wall seemed like the perfect place for one.
If you search “Barn Quilt on Pinterest you will see a ton of designs and pictures of quilts. I knew I wanted something simple and selected a modified version of the Ohio Star. It is really just nine equal squares with some of the squares divided diagonally.
I found this version on House of Hawthornes. Her quilt is on her porch too. She has great instructions and makes a three color quilt. I am not going to go through all the steps because the instructions are on their site and easy to understand. I am just going to tell you what I did differently.
I made my quilt 3 foot by 3 foot for the scale of the porch and used 3/4 inch plywood because that was what we had here to make a 4 color quilt.
I sanded, primed, and painted the entire board the light color that is in the corners and the edges of the stars then drew the design on top of the painted board.
Let me tell you that taping and untaping the different blocks on the quilt are tricky. I should have painted the base color over the tape because even though I pushed, smashed, and, pressed the tape it still bled when I painted.
I used the trim color, Behr Dove for the base color, our house door color Behr Whiskey Barrel because I wanted some brown to coordinate with our cool vintage porch door. The center is the turquoise color of the interior Behr Ocean Boulevard. I wanted some green in the quilt because of our tree filled property and found a color I liked for 50 cents on the Home Depot mistint rack. I always check that rack. It is 9.00 for a gallon of mistint, 3.00 for a quart, and 50 cents for samples. I am a fan of mistint paint.
I used a small brush to touch up the areas where the paint bled once everything was good and dry.
During the touch ups.
Once I was satisfied with the touch up it got a coat Polycrylic to seal it and got mounted on the wall. I really like the look.
It looks so good mounted on the wall.
I enjoyed making it and look forward to having it for years.
If things go as they have been for the last week, by the time I wake up tomorrow I will have had 50,000 page views on my little teeny tiny minnow of a blog. I will also be celebrating two years of blogging. There are blogs out there that get 50,000 page views a day and it has taken me two years. I never said I was fast. first and foremost, I want to say thank you, friends, for reading, thank you for commenting, and thank you for causing me to improve what I produce. I still have no idea what I am doing most of the time. By that I mean my husband and I are making it up as we go on our projects, and sometimes failing miserably. I am about the most technology challenged blogger out there. There have been many times when I did something on the blog but had no idea what I did, how to fix it, or if it was good, how to repeat that good thing. Between the time I started this blog and now both our children have married, my husband and I changed jobs, we sold a home, went a while “between homes”, bought a home and moved to a new city, my son and daughter in law have moved in part-time, I started a new blog called My Burb Home, and I have taken up photography as a hobby. Not bad for two folks in their 50’s.
This next year we plan to travel to two places on our bucket list, work on both our weekend home and our suburban home, build a raised garden, put in a fire pit,and continue to work on found furniture. Life is good for this weekend loving couple.
I wanted to share with you some projects from the last two years. As I looked back, there were others that could have or should have made the cut but I plan on rewriting several of them now that I don’t stink like when I started. Not many of you were around when I first logged in, set up an account and started rambling so some of the projects below may be new to you. Just click on the hyperlink and it will take you to the original blog. I hope you enjoy.
10. French provincial furniture makeover. I love that we were able to take a couple of homely particle board pieces of furniture and make them beautiful. I am seriously considering selling this set because I want to redo the room like now I recently saw on a home tour but I love the color combination and how much I learned on this project.
9. Western Dresser. We found a homely little Goodwill dresser and made it something fun for the lake house guest room we call the bunk room.
8. Table and Banquette seating out of reclaimed wood. Wow! This is one of my oldest posts and my dinky little camera did not do this beauty any justice. I will be re-photographing this set. This was a collaboration between Hubby and me to come up with a solution to a tiny space using reclaimed siding from our house. It is one of the most functional spaces in our home now.
7. Farmhouse Table. I love the look of a rustic table but man, they are expensive. Our $90.00 solution to this problem turned out to be one of my favorite pieces of furniture. It moved with us and was where we gathered for our first Thanksgiving meal in the new home.
6. Wedding Chalkboard. I did tell you my kids got married, right? I was fortunate enough that both my daughter and daughter in law wanted me to make personal items for their wedding. I loved that they wanted things that I worked on as a part of their special day. The link above is one of those items, an ornate frame my daughter in law, Sweet Amanda, found at a resale shop that I redid for the wedding and added a chalkboard. I chose this one because it was the first wedding project. I love all four of my precious kids.
5. Map Chair. Another piece of furniture that needs to be re-photographed. This little chair would be easy to recreate for a friend moving to a new city or a college student who needs to remember where home is. I seem to have a thing for chairs.
4. Painted Suitcases. I have made a total of seven of these painted suitcases now The link is to four of them I did at one time. I love finding cheap old hard sided suitcases, priming, painting, distressing, glazing then adding a chalkboard to one side. It makes a great entry into a home when guests are coming over or to announce an event. If I ever started a business, I would sell these because I enjoy mine so much.
3. Junk Fairy End Table. The last three are easy. They are my favorite, favorite projects. They speak to my love of color, family and friends. The junk fairy ( AKA The Social Planner) dropped off this homely table while we were gone one day. I did not need it, so posted a photo of it on Facebook and offered to redo it for a friend. Robin snagged it. I am happy that she chose green as the color for the table. I really like how the stained top turned out. I enjoyed it so much that I painted a table in my own home close to the same colors.
2. Beverage Station. I am now working on number three of these babies. What a great re-purpose project for an old stainless sink and a sewing machine cabinet. I love the look and they make entertaining in a back yard or porch more inviting. My favorite blue color, Behr sailboat blue, got used here. My long-suffering husband gets major credit for the stainless sink idea here.
1. Mudroom Bench. When we moved this year I literally looked for homes that my mudroom bench would fit in. It is by far my most favorite project to date. I look forward to the day that someone sends me a photo of their version of the project. http://theweekendcountrygirl.com/2013/01/28/toilet-paper-roll-art/; A found dresser, waiting for heavy trash pickup, and a resale shop mirror turned into this beauty.
I hope you enjoyed my little walk down memory lane. Thank you for taking the time to look back on my last two years. Thank you for allowing me to share what we do.
I learned something years a ago from my dad. Everything in retail is potentially up for negotiation. May dad will go tool shopping at Sears, and he will ask…”Is this your best price?” When the answer is yes, that is our best price, he asks about floor models, then he asks to speak to the manager. Rarely does he pay the listed price. On anything. I am not as brave as he is, but occasionally I do ask.
Recently I was in Kirklands. It was a 5 day sale and they had some really cute things on sale. I spotted a big wall pumpkin. Regular price was $24.99 but it was on sale for $16.00. I loved the size and the shape but I wasn’t so crazy about the bow.
Here it is online:
When I saw one that had the bow torn loose I worked up my courage and took fit to the register. I asked the nice lady at the register if I could take the torn one at a reduced price. Guess what? Instead of $16.00, she sold it to me for $10.00.
I brought home the pumpkin then got busy.
A new burlap bow, and a cheap fall floral pick later I ended up with a super cute wall decoration. Doesn’t it look cute? I had Hubby hang the window under our covered front walk because it is going to serve as a seasonal backdrop for decorating.
This is a great semi-homemade quick project. I guess Dad knew what he was doing!
Sometimes a girl just wants a pumpkin. Sometimes a guy is tired and doesn’t want to cooperate. What is a girl to do? Make that pumpkin herself!
Hubby declared this weekend a no work weekend. I tried to cooperate. I promise. But, the armoire needed glazing, the bench needed building, the yard needed mowing and there was scrap wood lying around from the wood wall just crying out to be used.
It was not a “no-work” weekend.
Here are the very simple steps to making the pumpkin.
Collect the reclaimed wood and lay them out side by side on a table top.
Connect the wood together with screws and a drill. I used strips we cut from cutting the sides of each board on the table saw but any wood will work even a whole fence board would have done the job. I drilled a pilot hole then screwed in the screws so that I did not crack the small strips of wood.
Take a marker and draw out a pumpkin shape. I plan on making some bigger ones for the yard next weekend. I like them to look irregular.
Use a jigsaw to follow the shape. I used clamps to hold it in place while I cut. Don’t be scared. I had to make some funny cuts because of the curves.
Here she is naked:
And with a bow:
Tie a burlap bow and silk leaves on the finished product. Ta Dah!
Here is a sneak peek at the armoire. Revival Mahogany, Powdered Snow, and glaze, I am so happy with the results.
Herringbone patterned art is showing up all over Pinterest. Of course I had to try my hand at it for the new house. The results were pretty good for a first try.
Here is the tutorial for what is really a simple, but time consuming, art project.
I bought this frame with a covered bridge print in it from my favorite thrift store for $2.00. The print was on super heavy cardboard that was in good shape. It became the base for the art project. The frame just needed to be painted when the art project was done. It was a nice size for a first attempt. The cardboard print was 18″X24″ with the frame adding four inches to each side.
I purchased three bottles of Plaid brand paints in the colors that coordinate with the room. I literally poured the paint in strips on the cardboard print then got a big brush and started mixing the edges together.
Here are the results:
While the paint was drying I rolled out two long sections of Frog painter’s tape. I cut one of them into 5 inch sections and the other into 3 inch sections because I wanted there to be a little more interest in the pattern. I modified the pattern you see below by making the alternating diagonal two inches shorter.
Once it was totally dry I started taping down wide green tape. I may or may not have gotten the blow dryer out to speed the process because I am impatient 🙂 The picture of this part did not come out at all. GRRR. Because I was impatient to get started painting over the tape, I did not check the picture before moving on to the next step. It was way too dark to show. I frustrate myself when I mess up like this. Here is my inspiration:
English: A herringbone bond in bricklaying. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I put down a section of 5″ tape at an angle on the cardboard canvas then put a 3″ section at the end of the 5″ piece to match the width, leaving a sort of grout line sized space between each piece. I went to Pinterest for Herringbone examples at this point to make sure that I was at least on track. Once I got a whole row done across the cardboard canvas, completing the taping went quickly because I just had to keep the spacing the same and follow the pattern.
Once the whole painting was covered, I painted white plaid paint over the grout-ish lines that I created by leaving space between the tape. As soon as the paint covered everything, I gently started peeling tape up.
I painted the white paint on fairly light so that it would minimize the drippy edges.
A coat of white spray paint on the frame and I was done. Easy. Ta Dah!
I love it above the bed. It really helps to tie the room together.
Here are some of the blogs that I visited for inspiration:
When we moved into our burb house, I did not plan on painting the walls right away, except the front guest room. Here is how the room looked when we purchased the house.
I am not going to talk about the paint job in the front bedroom except to say it was not my style and the color scheme wouldn’t work. I know that the former owner worked really hard on the faux painting.
As soon as we settled in I started looking for inspiration. Here are some of the inspiration pictures I found. I hope that clicking on them allows you to go site I found it at.
I wanted the bedroom to be cheery but restful.
Here is what we have finished to date:
Walls painted. I love the light blue walls. They almost feel like a spa.
Empty frames painted. I found the frames at a resale shop. I spent $4.00 total on all the frames you see on this wall. The paint on the frames is all left overs from other projects. The white plates were 10 cents each at the resale shop. I glued metal soda can tabs to the back of the plates with E6000. I love that stuff.
My bedding arrived. I am crazy about this yellowish paisley print. Target. Over budget. $90.00.
The throw pillows on the bed are all outdoor pillows that were on clearance at Home Depot, Lowes, and Marshall’s.
Curtains hung. Hubby and I went shopping at Ikea recently. I was thrilled to find off the shelf curtains that were 110 inches long for $34.00 a pair.
The herringbone art project done.
I will be writing a DIY on this project. It was a fun evening project that cost less than $10.00 even factoring in the cost of the green tape. ( I have plenty of tape to do several more projects.)$2.00 for the frame and the print that I painted over, Frog tape was $6.00 and I had to get one can of flat white spray paint for the frame. (I need to spray the frame again.) I had the other paint on hand.
The green lamp is in place. I think it is the best $2.00 I have spent in this room.
New art work. Target. Over budget. $20.00
New lamp from Target. $23.00. I know, I know but the colors in the shade go perfectly with the color scheme. Over budget.
I am not a huge fan of the bed frame as is and it will get painted and the posts are going to get trimmed down. I found this funky curio cabinet at a garage sale for a dollar. Here is the before.
Dirt Dobber nests and spiders were included for free. A quick wash down, spray painted the frame and painted the back that amazing Laguna color I love. I am not sure how long it will stay but I think it is a fun piece for now. For a buck investment, It will not kill me to let it go down the road.
I was able to incorporate the old dresser that once belonged to my grandparents, saved by my husband and completely restored.
We have ceiling fans in our bedrooms thanks to a friend of Baby Boy and Sweet Amanda. Don’t judge us for the fans. I think they look ok, It is going to be over a 100 again today here in the burbs. In South East Texas it is miserable without air moving.
I went resale shopping Friday. Hubby and some buddies were golfing so I was on my own. I made quite a haul.
The projects will be showing up soon. The first repurpose from my weekend is a quick and CHEAP project. On my adventure I spotted an ornate frame with a broken mirror in it buried in a pile of paintings and frames. I dug it out of a pile of other frames. The pastor who runs the thrift shop told me he had dropped the mirror. He just doesn’t know what to do about me, he doesn’t get that I love the broken, chipped, old stuff more than the newer treasures. I asked for the price, he said fifty cents. SOLD!
Here she is with the mirror removed. The back of the mirror was marked May 5- 67. She is younger than me and considered vintage…sad.
I explained to the pastor when he asked that I would be painting the frame and putting a bright print where the mirror was…he said he would pray for my husband. Three times. ( He upped it to four times later in my shopping.)
I purchased a roll of coral wrapping paper at Marshall’s that I will be using to line the back of my milk glass display. It is perfect for the “mirror hole”.
I had left over paint from the giant ornate mirror and could not resist the bright shiny look on this silly frame.
An old S from a wreath I took apart finishes the beauty off. Fun, huh?
Not bad for a total investment of about $1.50 in supplies. It will add a little silliness to the green bedroom. No seven years of bad luck here.
The Southern Belle had a Pinterest party Tuesday night. It was a great way to have friends over, work on projects, and learn new things. I loved most of all the opportunity to meet some of her friends in North Carolina. The projects going on were: a spring wreath, jute/burlap wrapped wine bottles for an upcoming wedding reception (with the coolest hand crocheted roses!), faux milk glass and mercury glass, making rainbow and pot of gold treat bags for coworkers, and a welcome sign for a front entry. I have never been to a Pinterest Party before but I loved it. Every person brings the stuff for their own Pinterest craft idea then works on it. I am SO SAD that I messed up my camera so the only shots I have are from The Southern Belle’s iPhone. There are times when I am really not too smart. I hope that the others took pictures so that I can update this post. Several of them promised to send me pictures of their finished projects and I am holding them to it.
The food was great! Thank you sweet girl for planning this for us.
This past weekend I made two unusual finds at one of my favorite resale shops; a music book for a flute for twenty five cents and four 78 records for fifty cents each.
What to do with these items? I looked at them for a while then decided they need to go together.
I decided to use the music book to cover a board that the albums will be screwed to with a large screw in the center of each record. I am saving the dust covers and I am doing no damage to the records. I am not sure if the records are worth anything, but I will bet they are worth more than fifty cents!
I Mod Podged the sheet music to a scrap board and allowed it to dry. I am absolutely the worst at getting all the wrinkles out, but I keep trying.
Then I spaced the albums out on the board and hubby screwed them down. They are going up in the game room where we have some album covers framed. This will be a perfect addition to the room.
I love the results. Not too bad for $1.75 art! Pictures of the upstairs game coming room soon.
