DIY Mason Jars for the Fall

October 22, 2015 / TakeTimetoCreate / 2 Comments

Mason jars are the best. What is not to love, they are the perfect storage container for just about anything. Also, when I get a jar from my mom there is a good chance that it might already be filled with yummy jelly or jam or salsa or something else equally as good. And that makes the jar that much better.

But for this DIY I am using empty jars that will be filled with candy corn. For us the candy corn season is a major event. And yes, we celebrate the candy corn season very enthusiastically, from beginning to end.

I decided to make a festive mason jar that can hold our yummy candy corn and look cute at the same time. Also, we live in a very small house and any decorations need to be small, or very versatile. These mason jars are easy to switch out with the various seasons. In Dec I will show you my Christmas mason jars. So lets get to the tutorial.

Materials:

Mason jar. I pick up some at the dollar store and used ones from my mom. Any jars will do as long as they have the lids with them.

Fake flowers, I picked mums for the fall, but any will do

Hot glue
Ribbon
Window clings. Here are the ones that I found at the dollar store, I love how it looks fall and festive, with out being over the top.

Candy Corn, or any candy you want to fill your jar with

Instructions:

~ First cut off the stems to your fake flowers. You still want the green part under the flower to hold everything together. I used 3 flowers per jar, but depending on your flowers you might use more or less on your jar.

~ Using hot glue, glue the flowers to the top of the jar.

~ using hot glue, glue your ribbon to the ring of the jar. by only gluing things to the jar lid and the ring and not the jar you are able to switch out the lids (rather than switching out the entire jar) for different holidays.

~ add a window cling to the jar for more festivity. Window clings are non permanent and reusable making them perfect for this project.

~ Add your favorite candy and enjoy! That is it! Enjoy this easy DIY for fall!

If you want to know how I made the lanterns you can go to this blog post.

And if you want to know how we made the fireplace mantle you can go to this blog post.

Paint a Plastic Dollar Store Vase with Nail Polish

September 29, 2015 / TakeTimetoCreate / Leave a comment

First I have to tell you about the free arm knitting class I took last night at Michael’s. It was awesome.

I am was excited to finally learn how to arm knit and check out the infinity scarf that I made!

So much fun, and the instructor was wonderful and very patient! Once I got the hang of it, it was easy to do and very fast. I can’t wait to make other things with arm knitting. You can be sure I will feature arm knitting projects in the future Smile

Anyway, on to the other project I did this weekend….

I was wandering around the Dollar Store this weekend and I saw this plastic vase. It looks like it could be a cut crystal vase from a distance, I am talking about way distant, like a mile or so. But up close you can really tell that it is plastic. So I thought I would help the vase out and give it sparkles and color.

Here is the vase in all its glory.

And here is an up close to of the “cut crystal” part of the vase. I like the design and it is pretty enough to use.

Materials:

~ Vase you want to paint

~ Nail Polish. Any color will do. I used this copper color called DS Glow from OPI, I thought it was perfect for fall and the holidays. This vase will work for a variety of holidays, which is a good thing. But at a dollar for each vase you can make a new one for each holiday.

Instructions:

1. Paint a first coat over the parts you want colored.

2. Add a second coat, more if needed. I just added color in a few strategic parts on the vase. Now I know that my painting is not perfect, but I am convinced that it adds to the charm of the vase. Perfection can be overrated Smile

3. Let dry then add flowers, candy, marbles,or anything else you thing would look good in your new vase.

I put mums in the vase for the fall.

Here is the vase with poinsettias in it rather than the mums. Ready for Christmas.

Paint Your Couch!? Say What?

September 10, 2015September 10, 2015 / TakeTimetoCreate / 1 Comment

I know what you are going to say, that is crazy! Painting your couch! There are better ways to update your couch. I will agree there might be better ways, but this is a great solution for my dingy, old couch that needed an update.

This couch is great, it has individual sections that can be moved if needed, and the ottomans can have the soft footstool side facing up or a hard table surface facing up. It is very versatile and we have enjoyed it for many years. The downside is that the couch is made of a light colored micro fiber that stains easily. over the years the couch has become a collection of stains. I have tried to remove them, but after awhile nothing would work. So I had the option of recovering the cushions or to paint them. I decided on painting because I thought it would be easier.

See stains (I am actually embarrassed to show you guys this stain, and I just couldn’t bring myself to showing you the bigger ones.) And this was just a small one…

Overall it was pretty easy, but time consuming.

Here is how I did it if you are interested in doing the same with your furniture.

Materials:

~ Fabric Spray paint. I used Simply Spray Fabric Paint in Sage green. For my couch I used 12 bottles, which was about $120. Not the cheapest solution, but cheaper than recovering all the cushions but cheaper than buying a new couch. I bought my paint from Amazon.

~ Furniture that you want to paint.

~ Plastic covering for your work area, and room for your items to dry

~ Rubber gloves

Some notes:

Before I evens started I watched a ton of YouTube videos on how to do this and I read all the instructions and I looked over the company website. I took my time getting to know the product and how to use it. Before doing this yourself I would recommend doing your own research and practicing before you do your entire couch.

You can see here that our couch was a very light beige color. It blended in with the walls and the floor and it was very boring. Not to mention dirty. I thought the green would make it more interesting and make our living room more inviting rather than bland. Lyle was skeptical, but he was on board with my experiment.

Here is a picture of beige town that was our living room.

I will tell you that you should do it all at once rather than space it out over a few years….

Yes you read that correctly, I did this project over the span of 2 years. I am sure you all have had a project that you started and didn’t get back to for a while, well this project was one that took me a whole to get back to. I started it one weekend and got half of the couch done. I didn’t have any pictures of it because I was embarrassed that I didn’t finish in a timely manner Smile well eventually I decided to finish the project. Lyle was very patient and didn’t nag me toooooo much about the unfinished couch in our living room. But I did go back and finish. That is why the colors are a little different from cushion to cushion. The 2 year time span is evident. My technique changed a bit and some fading happened. Oh well, it is done and we are happy with the final result so that is all that matters.

Instructions:

1. Clean your furniture. You want to make sure you have a clean slate so the paint will adhere to the cushion.

2. Take your cushions to your work area. We put plastic all over in our garage so that I could work in there. The cushions could dry without being outside where dirt and leaves would blow on to the wet paint. And if it started to rain I could close the garage door and keep the cushions dry.

3.Put your gloves on. Spray a light coat on the cushion, then rub the paint into the fabric. I did this and I think it coated better.

4. Let it dry and spray and rub again. I did 3 coats, that seemed to get the best coverage. After the first 2 coats you will think to yourself “What on earth have I done? This looks like crap!” But hang in there, by the third coat everything looked better.

5. Let the whole thing dry over night then put it back on your couch.

Enjoy your “new” couch. This project has been completely finished for over a year now and I can honestly say I still love the final result. The paint has stayed on the couch and doesn’t rub off on your clothes (this was a concern of Lyle’s) and it still looks good. At first the fabric was a little stiff and not as soft as it was before the paint, but over time the paint loosens up and the fabric becomes softer. It won’t ever be as soft as the original micro fiber, but it is getting better.

So, is painting your couch something you might do? What else do you think I should paint?

DIY TARDIS Door!

June 25, 2013June 1, 2015 / TakeTimetoCreate / 1 Comment

I will admit I am a Whovian! I have loved Doctor Who since I was a child and I think I will love it to my dying day. Thanks to the reboot I introduced The Doctor to my son, and to my relief he loves it! So, I decided to paint the door to the bathroom in the basement like the TARDIS door.

This was a fairly simple project. First I took the door off the hinges and took it outside to paint. I chose the color Brilliant Blue paint and primer in a semi gloss finish by Olymic. I got the paint from my local Lowes. Then I painted and painted and painted. There are tons of tutorial about how to paint doors all over the internet, so if you need help I would Google. It was pretty straight forward but it did take 3 coats of paint to get the deep blue I was looking for.

Here is my door before I started. Pretty boring! Just a plain 6 panel door. But it will be better soon!

If it looks terrible after the first and second coats, don’t worry the third coat will help smooth it out and make it look great. You might have to do touch ups in a few place, but overall 3 coats should do it.

See pretty bad, but it will get better!

Let it fully dry before you hang

Between coats I spray painted my hardware the Rustoleum Oil Rubbed Bronze color. Just clean them with a TSP cleaner, lightly sand, wipe off then paint away. We are painting all our hardware to update it from the shiny brass color.

Once the door was hung I applied decals (the windows and police box sign are decals) I didn’t think I could paint them, so I found some great ones on Etsy. Here is a link to the seller https://www.etsy.com/shop/Walkingdeadpromotion

We love our TARDIS door, what do you think?

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DIY Mason Jars for the Fall

Paint a Plastic Dollar Store Vase with Nail Polish

Paint Your Couch!? Say What?

DIY TARDIS Door!