A Black and White Giveaway!

I've been watching a number on my sidebar. 

It keeps going up. 

I'm getting close to 200 posts!
Who knew I had that much to say?

Help me celebrate!

 This is what you could win.

Two hobnail milk glass vases. 

One black and white enameled pan.

Two pairs of white ceramic electrical insulators that look pretty cute as knobs on cabinets or drawers. They came off some old fences on our farm.

Some shower curtain rings that say "hot" and "cold". 

A linen tea towel with a bee and laurel motif embroidered on it.

One bottle of black craft paint, and one bottle of white craft paint.

A set of sticker photo frames.

Two booklets of vintage sheet music.

Two white enameled number tags.

One surprise item from Las Vegas, 

and anything else I can think of from now until 200!

Just leave a comment to win.

If you want another chance to win, blog about it or put it on your sidebar and let me know in a separate comment.

You don't have to be a follower to win~but it would be nice if you were, since this is my way of saying "thank you!" to everyone who reads my blog, or at least scrolls through the pictures. 

You have until I hit 200 to enter!

Happy New Year, everyone!

My Top Projects

I was trying to decide what my favorite projects were this year. 
I came up with nine. Not all of these are projects that got the most comments, or the most traffic. They're just the ones I like the most.

I had to include the tables.

This one on our patio.

This one in my cra(p)ft room. 

And this one, also in the cra(p)ft room.
I spent almost nothing on all three.

I was inordinately pleased with myself over this project, mostly because it was so hard.

And this one, because I did it myself.

I liked how our kitchen turned out, too.

And this project, because it was no cost.

And then there was this project

and this one.


It's been a fun year! 
I've got a few large scale projects that I  hope I can do this coming year. I'm not really a planner, so I don't know for certain what's in store. 
I just look around and see what grabs me. 


Thanks for reading, thank you for commenting, and really big thank you from the bottom of my heart for encouraging me and inspiring me these past months. You are all the kindest funniest bunch of people I've ever met!

linking up

Fun Presents

I got some great presents this Christmas. Two of them are decor related so I thought I'd show you.

Exhibit #1~this old apothecary bottle with the original paper and cork still intact.

How cool is that??

I'm not sure where I'll put it. For now, right there is good.

But as I look at it, I realize that I need more of them.

Two more, to be exact. So Mother's day and my birthday shouldn't be all that hard to shop for. 

(not so subtle hint)

Next up 

 exhibit #2~this super cute bee plaque!

Love it!

 I really like bees.

If I see something with a bee on it, I usually snap it up. I really went over-board on some white enameled things I found this spring at TJMaxx. (But that's another post.)

I'm not sure where this will end up, either.

  But probably not there. 

Thanks for reading!

A Tough Guy Chest With Girly Girl Drawers

Sounds like a movie about a weight lifting cross dresser, doesn't it? 
It's not.
Remember when I showed you these?

 I had a tough time cleaning them up.

They were used in a shop of some kind, and there was grease and grime all over the insides of the drawers. 

Tamarah, of Shabby Vintage Junk told me how to clean them. I thought I'd share her tip with you.
"I just wanted to send you a quick note re your difficulty cleaning the oil from your YUMMY drawers....I don't know if you know & if you forgive me for blathering pointlessly if you do but the BEST thing I find for cleaning oil from wood is methylated spirits....I put it UNDILUTED in a spray bottle & use liberally....I tend to use a scrubbing brush while I'm squirting it & then hose off the grime before washing down with sugar soap (detergent if you don't have SS over there) & a sponge....!
Works like a treat EVERY time & I'm NEVER put off from buying or salvaging oily items....!!"

If only I'd checked my email sooner, and I could have perfectly clean drawer innards!

I had already decoupaged the insides of the drawers with some pretty paper just so I could stand to put things in them, but cleaning them with Tamarah's method would have been ideal.

I'll give you a peek at my drawers. (hehehe)

The top drawer. And the least matchy matchy drawer. 

My daughter helped me, so it was a lot of fun. We used scrapbook paper.

We just did a random patchwork of paper.

Did you notice the silver handle? Yeah. I removed the paint from the top drawers and now I know why they were painted. They weren't brass like the others. I want them to all be brass!

I found these online, 

and they might work, but I think I might wait and see if some turn up that are more authentic.

This is my favorite drawer. And the only pink one. Some of the paper went on smoother than the others. I decided to be philosophical about that.

A few wrinkles never hurt anyone.

I ran out of Mod Podge part way through. I didn't want to drive 15 miles to get more, so I just used plain old school glue and watered it down a little bit. 4 to 1 was a pretty good ratio.

So now I have these really kick-butt looking stacked chests of drawers, with really girly looking insides.

I like them, but next time I'm taking Tamarah's advice. 

I'm almost done organizing, and I'll show you where I put these when I'm done. Someone is sleeping in that room, so I have to wait until said person goes home. Not that I'm kicking them out the door or anything. 

Thanks for reading!
 

I Jumped On The Bandwagon

You've all seen this before,

but I like the look, so I made some.(one? is it a unit now, or still separate books?)

 I found everything in (where else?) my garage.

I just tore the covers off some old and really boring looking books. The leather strap is actually part of an old gun holster that belonged to my husband's grandfather. He was the sheriff here, too.

It's used to strap the holster to your leg.

(It was, apparently, the must-have accessory for any self respecting mid-century gun slinger.)
I like how the strap looks as opposed to tying it all together with twine. I think it's a tad more polished.

One of the books has some really interesting print on the spine. I don't know what it means.

So there you have it. 

How was your Christmas? Mine was great!

I got THE best present!

I'm going to be a grandma!!!

What was your best present?

Gathered Burlap Garland

If you want a very long garland, you'll need at least 2 yards of burlap.

You also need scissors, a needle and some strong thread. 

I made my garland from strips that were about 5 inches wide. You can do it as wide as you want, but if you go too narrow, it won't ruffle well.

Burlap is really easy to cut.

Just find a thread at the bottom and pull. Cut it or break it.

 That gives you a line to follow.

Cut out your strips.

Then thread your needle with a double strand of thread about a yard long.

Find the center of your strip of burlap.

(that looks off, but it was the center.)

Then loop the thread around the end a few times,

and tie a sturdy knot.

Then start stitching. I made fairly large stitches. Just pull the thread as you go along, and the ruffles will start to appear.

You can made a super full garland, or one that's only slightly gathered. It's up to you.

It's not hard to add more strips to the same thread.

Just string it on there.

It doesn't even show when it's all ruffled up. If you run out of room on your thread, just cut the needle off, thread the needle with new thread, tie the end of the new thread to the old thread(make sure you don't "lose" the old strand of thread in the garland), and you're back in business!

And it looks really cute on the tree!

Some people use fray check on the edges of the burlap, but I didn't. I like it when it looks a little frayed. The strings that shed are kind of a pain, but most holidays are messy like that.(Think Easter grass.) I try not to sweat it.

This will be my last post this week.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas! 

Thanks for reading!

Stars

I showed you these a few days ago

Someone asked if I could show you how I made them.

It's super simple.

Cut out a star.

I used my Cricut, but if you don't have one, just find a star on the internet and use it as a pattern, then cut it out with scissors or an X-acto knife.

 Start folding the arms of the star. Just line the edges up and crease right down the middle.

(and I promise, contrary to how it looks in this photo, I am NOT flipping you the bird!)

 Fold each arm. If you aren't exactly in the middle it's OK. Sometimes you can't be that exact, but it will still turn out.

 Just guesstimate where the center is. If some of your folds don't go far enough, you can pinch them farther. If you go too far, don't sweat it. It won't show that much.

Then you bring each arm of the star next to the other, and fold them together.

 And you end up with this! (A very blurry star that I didn't fold on the right side. The other side is prettier.)

Anyway, I just used a hole punch at the top, and used buttons and thread to hang the stars on the trees. 

See? Super simple.

Up next~how to make a ruffled burlap garland. Also super simple.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's episode of 

"Far-too-late-in-the-season Christmas Crafts". 

Thanks for reading!