World Wide DIY Day

How many of you knew that this coming October 18, 2015, is World Wide DIY Day???  A day for all of us DIYers to embrace and honor the crafty among us.  Our very own day!!

How many of you who are addicted to Pinterest and pin the day away, but never ACTUALLY make anything you pin?  I bet there are quite a few of you!

Pull out your craft stash or your power tools and embrace your highly creative minds.  October 18th, World Wide DIY Day, is the day to finally get your DIY on and get some of those projects completed!

So with that said I am going to officially issue a challenge!

No!  Not start drinking wine at this hour!  I am challenging you to create something of your very own using a tutorial.

If you are in the neighborhood of Solana Beach, California, run, don't walk to the fabulous House Vintage Flea Market where my fellow Gypsies, Tramps, and Steve will be participating in a challenge of our own.

With this old wine bottle, we are going to be creating our very own pin-worthy tutorial that you can do with us in-person or at home.  Just follow along!  We will show you how to create a Spooky Potion Bottle for Halloween decorations.

To begin, you will need the following items:

DIY Paint (color of your choice)
Paint brush
DIY Liquid Patina in Crystal Clear Chandelier
DIY Liquid Patina in Dark and Decrepit
Label printed on printer paper (torn edges)
Water
Optional:  Burlap, twine or other embellishments

Follow these steps to make your own Spooky Potion Bottle!

1.)  Make sure your bottle is clean and dry.

2.)  Paint the entire bottle in a thin coat of DIY paint and let dry.

3.)  Paint a 2nd thin coat of DIY paint and let dry.

4.)  Pick your label of choice.  I love downloading cool ephemera from The Graphics Fairy.  Print and then tear the edges to make the paper look aged.

5.)  Using the Crystal Clear Chandelier Liquid Patina, coat the bottle with one light coat.  Let dry completely.

6.)  Spray a light mist of water on the front of your label.  Flip it over and coat the back with a generous coat of the Crystal Clear Chandelier Liquid Patina.

7.)  Position the label on your bottle and slowly smooth out the label avoid bubbles and wrinkles.

8.)  Once positioned on the bottle, let label dry.

9.)  Using a clean paint brush or sponge, coat the label and bottle with Dark and Decrepit Liquid Patina.  Use as little or as much desired to create an aged, grungy look.

10.)  Wipe off or work in the Dark and Decrepit Liquid Patina using cheesecloth or a lint-free cloth.

11.)  Finish with burlap and twine or light a candle in the top and allow the wax to drip down the bottle.

Ta Da!!!  You have your very own Spooky Potion Bottle.

You can do these in any color.  Group together to make a fun All Hallows Eve table decoration.

Come on down to the House Vintage Flea Market in Solana Beach, California, on Sunday October 18th and make your very own Spooky Potion Bottle.

Follow along and root for our fun team,  the Gypsies, Tramps, and Steve!!  Watch for our hashtag on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter #gypsiestrampsandsteve #diybootcamp

Visit my team member Facebook pages!

Turning Leaf Crafts

Studio Primrose

Spruce Collective

White Swan

The Painted Chest

Be sure to follow The Painted Chest on all of your favorite social media sites!

  
  

Vintage Vanity and Bed Makeover

I recently finished a vintage vanity and bed for a sweet little girl.

When discussing how to refinish this set which was being passed down from generation to generation, mom wanted to go a little more neutral with gray and the daughter wanted pink.  What little girl doesn't want pink?

I made a suggestion to mom about using both pink and gray and we made a compromise that made everyone happy.

This set was painted with Debi Beards' DIY Paint in Letterpress Gray and Petticoat Pink.  Two sweet colors that work very well together.  It was finished with clear wax.

The center mirror was broken when it arrived.  Replacing the center mirror would mean that it wouldn't have that great aged patina that the side mirrors had.  We were able to save the center mirror by applying a bead of silicon caulk in between the broken sections and around the edges of the mirror on the back.  That will ensure that mirror will not move within the frame and cause further damage.

We then took a strip of molding and routed the edges so it would fit snug against the frame and attached it over the break.  It looks like it has always been there.

You can purchase DIY Paint in-store or online HERE!  Click on the Products link to choose DIY Paint.

Be sure to follow The Painted Chest on all of your favorite social media sites!

  
  

Craigslist Wine Rack Update

So it's only taken me 7 months to finally finish my wine rack. We had a busy fall with Mini DIY starting preschool and then all the illnesses that come along with preschool germs.

A couple weekends ago, I decided enough was enough and I was going to finish my wine rack. I needed to get the wine out of my cabinets and my hubby needed the wine rack out of the shed. Now that it is finished, I've determined I have too much wine and need a bigger rack. Or I could just drink it. :)

If you remember, the wine rack was in pretty sad shape. Lots of dust, mildew, and some missing screws. Since it was only $10, I figured I could do something with it. After a good cleaning, repairing and sanding, I finally decided on a color: Valspar's Lake Country #5003-5C.

I'm really loving all the aqua and turquoise that I'm seeing out in blogland these days. It's quite a stretch from my typical decorating style. A style that I'm slowly but surely changing. I grabbed a million paint chips and spent a good hour pouring over them in the Lowes paint department...like I do everytime I decide to paint something. I picked Lake Country on a whim and I love it!

I painted one coat of Kilz primer and 2 coats of Lake Country on. I hit the edges and a few other places with the palm sander to distress it. After the paint had dried, I rubbed on a Valspar Antiquing Glaze all over. I think it toned down the paint color and gave it a nice rustic finish.

I didn't take any pictures of the painting and staining of the wine rack. I figure that is pretty self-explanatory.

The top that Mr. DIY cut for me is stained with a couple coats of Minwax Special Walnut. I decided that it wasn't really dark enough for me so after the Special Walnut dried, I went back over it with a couple coats of Minwax Dark Walnut.

So without further ado, here is my new wine rack.

And just a reminder of what it looked like before:

Many Furniture Refinishing Projects

Mr. DIY's 85-year-old grandmother passed away last week. She lived out on the family farm. We now have the task of cleaning out her house. Like many people from her generation, she was a "pack rat" or hoarder if you will. She saved everything from fast food containers to used tin foil. As we dig through the house, the treasures we are finding are phenomenal!

She was a quilter. She kept a notebook with a record of every quilt she ever made and who she made it for or sold it to. We are talking hundreds and hundreds of quilts...they were hand quilted, not machine quilted. Three Lane cedar chests full of finished quilts, quilt tops, blocks, embroidered pillow cases and doilies were divided between my husband and his sister. We each also chose a cedar chest to keep our treasures in.

The remaining items in the house will go to my husband and I. There are many antique dressers, tables, wooden chairs, a china cabinet, dry sink, and my absolute favorite...an antique wardrobe. I fell in love with it the minute I laid eyes on it. It even still has the key to lock it!

The only down side to these wonderful treasures...mouse droppings. Living on a farm and being an elderly, stubborn German lady (I say this with love, she was ornery!), she refused help with her house and the mice have taken over. My first instinct is to bleach everything, but I don't want to ruin any of the pieces.

I'm looking to my fellow DIY furniture refinishers for advice on how to clean these pieces so they are able to be used again and without hurting them.

I still need to take pictures of the pieces, but many of them are still in the house and will be moved to a storage trailer temporarily until I can work my way through them.

Craigslist Wine Rack

What can I say? We've had a busy summer and I'm just a lousy blogger.

I'm in the middle of refinishing a wooden wine rack that I purchased off Craigslist.

It was very wobbly and required new screws to reinforce it.

Mr. DIY also made a top for it. If you noticed in the first picture, the wine racks are stack-able. Mr. DIY had to drill holes in the top to fit down over the pegs. In order to get the correct depth, we used electrical tape wrapped around the drill bit. When the tape "tail" begins to "dust" the drill shavings from your board and touches the board, you know you have drilled deep enough. It's a neat little trick.

I have it all sanded down and ready to paint; however, I haven't chosen a color yet so it waits.

The Heavy Fence Gate

Mr. DIY and I decided to fence in our yard a few years ago. We had Lowes come out and measure our yard and tell us exactly how much lumber we would need. We purchase said lumber and bring it home. Being the DIYers that we are, we were going to install the fence ourselves. A week later, I found out I was pregnant. No lifting heavy fence posts for me.

Mr. DIY's step-dad came down on a Sunday a few weeks later and helped him set all the posts. Mr. DIY built the entire fence by himself without any help at all. It was interesting to watch. He/we had never done any kind of project like this before. So we were absolute novices when it came to hanging the gates. It really isn't a difficult task, but we weren't exactly sure how we wanted to handle the opening to our carport.

He sunk the posts in the ground as close to the house as he could get. The concrete footings from the house were in the way and there was just no way to chip the concrete back. So there was always a gap between the posts and the house. Something I wasn't too crazy about.

Being the novices that we were, we used the same 8ft. posts that we had used on the rest of the fence. This would have been fine if there had been more fencing connected to that post to help support the weight. So of course, the gate began to sag and had to be supported on the opposite side. This made it extremely difficult for me to open and close so I never used it. I would trek through the house to get from the front to the back yard....which means more dirt in my house. It's a vicious cycle I tell ya!

This weekend I had a brilliant idea! Let's mount the gate to the house and the shed on the carport. Okay, maybe not so brilliant, but the answer to my gate woes. This was a simple little project with lots of impact! We simply mounted the 4x4s to the house with 3 lag bolts each. That was probably the hardest part of the project because the bolts were rather long and beefy so our little battery-powered impact wrench would only take them so far. We had to screw the bolts the rest of the way in with a socket wrench with a cheater bar on it.

I can now open and close the gate with one hand. It swings freely and I don't have to lift up on it to open it. I am downright giddy over this gate! :)The gate along with the rest of the fence and the house needs a good pressure washing. My dad was using it all weekend so it will have to wait until next weekend.

Hindsight also tells me we really didn't need take the posts all the way to the top. We could have just cut them a little above the gate. We just had it in our heads that we needed a spacer between the posts to keep them spread apart. This isn't necessary since they are bolted to the house. Live and learn.

Cutting down the old posts. Hopefully he will get them dug out next weekend and we can get started with some landscaping back here.
Drilling the pilot holes for the lag bolts.

Those are some beefy lag bolts. Getting ready to screw them in.

The finished gate from the inside of the carport.

It needs a good pressure washing, but it looks so much better. I love how it is flush with the siding.

For Kat:

I sucked it up and took pictures of the living room floor. Please note that I did not take them during the day where every little speck of dust would show. LOL!

Please ignore the hideous floor lamp circa 1986, the wooden doors, and no trim. It's all a work in progress I tell ya. The floor lamp came from the depths of the spare room. With the dark floors, the room seems even darker in the evenings so we needed some light. I'm currently shopping for end tables.

The kid stuff...well, what can I say, we live in a small house. I always swore that I wouldn't have a living room full of brightly colored plastic toys. It's a totally different story once said child is here. I did move the little picnic table to my office for a while, but it was just too tight in there.

Yes, the curtains are too short. I hung them straight out of the package from Pier 1. They had been up a year when we refinished the floors. I figured it was time to wash them. Per instructions on the tag, I washed them in cold water and did a very cool dry cycle. I am NOT KIDDING when I tell you that these things shrunk by almost a foot! I was completely stunned when I saw them hanging there. I need to lower the curtain rod of find new curtains. Neither of which is an easy task.

Those windows are 144" long. That's right...12 FEET LONG. That rod is stretched at maximum capacity and hanging by a wish and a prayer. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a curtain rod that long?

All in due time. One of these days it will all be finished. I've just got to learn how to finish one project before starting another. I'm impulsive. What can I say?