Fall Door Sign

It feels so good to be back.  I missed my blog and putting my stuff on here so to be able to post today makes me really happy.  After my son ended up in the hospital, It was really hard to sit down and do art.  Not just because I needed to make sure he was doing okay at all times but I felt overwhelmed with doctor appointments and a lot of other stuff going on.  Now that life is back to normal I definitely needed to get back to art.  It's what keeps me sane!  Don't worry, I am not neglecting my son, he is currently sitting on my lap  while I type this. :)

I posted before the Summer and the Halloween sign.  I loved those so much that I just needed to finish my fall sign.  I was debating for some time if it needed to be a Thanksgiving or autumn theme.   Hey, I enjoy Thanksgiving but one of the reasons I truly love this time of the year it's because of autumn!  That is what I am thankful for.  It is a beautiful season with all the beautiful colors, the cool weather, and yummy food.  It makes me sad that it doesn't last that long.   Plus, it is right in between Halloween and Christmas, which in my opinion are the best holidays of the year.

Like always, I like to show the process.  I started off with a sketch.  I went online and looked at a few leaves and the colors so I could gather what I wanted to do.  I have found that every time I find good references, my paintings are always better.

Once I had a general idea of what I wanted, I sketched it on the painted wooden plaque.  Then I started painting the letters with white acrylic paint.

I like when leaves still have a little bit of green in them and start to transition into the yellows, oranges, and reds.  The first leaf I wanted to have some green in the middle and the rest of the colors toward the outside.

The colors are remarkable!  If you look at real leaves, you will notice patches of colors and transitions from one color to another.  Don't forget the veins, it brings realism to the leaf.  Lastly, erase the pencil marks and add some wire in the back.

Then it is ready to hang on your door.


If you are not careful and leave your sign on the floor, then someone might think its a welcome mat.

Ha ha ha ha!  I love those funky toes.



Thanks for reading!

Decorative Door Signs

These last two weeks have also been fun.  I have been having a lot of fun lately.  All thanks to my friend Corinne who comes up with great ideas for crafts.  Plus the holiday seasons are near and there is always a lot of crafty things to do around that time.

So we started working on decorating our front doors, perfect place to start.  We went to Hobby Lobby and bought these wooden plaques.

Yes, they were $2.99, not bad unless you are planning on making a lot of signs.  We also bought ribbon and some wire to attach on the back of the plaque.

I decided to work on the "Happy Halloween" sign and I knew that a jack-o-lantern would be a great design.

I didn't want it to have a cute face like most people would expect an inviting door sign to have.  It needed to have a scary one, it just makes it more interesting.  I also wanted it to look like it was glowing from the inside.  First you add the orange-red color to the inside parts of your pumpkin and make sure to let it dry. Then lighten it up with some yellow-orange but make sure you leave  the top area of the eyes with your first color.  Finally bright yellow on the bottom of the eyes.

The letters were the easiest to do.  Why?  Well if you want to go for creepy dripping letters, you don't have to make it look perfect.  The more you swivel your brush around, the better it looks.  The final touch was the border to tie everything together.   We then added two nails in the back and attached a wire so it could hang. Corinne was so nice to add that part for me and made those cute little bows with her ribbon.

My next sign is this super cute watermelon design.  I LOVE watermelon.  I think I am obsessed with it.  I even took the time to paint my nails in a watermelon design.  Sadly I can only enjoy during the summer time.  This is my memento to my favorite food.

Our goal for these signs is to make them all simple but attractive.  I wish I could post the signs Corinne made but I forgot to take pictures of the ones she came up with. Maybe I can do a post of all our signs at the end of the year!

My next sign will be a fall/thanksgiving design.  I haven't decided yet.  We did start off by painting it a dark taupe.

It's perfect for that rustic look.  I made sure to get into the grooves on the side because I sort of missed a side on my minty watermelon sign.

Beautiful right?  I love this color for fall.  I haven't decided what design I want to do yet but looking forward to painting this one.

Thanks for reading!

My "Happy Little Accident"

I had tons of fun last week.  On Tuesday I went to G'nosh!, it's this art studio where you can paint an easy, fun, and breathtaking painting... in one class.   They have an instructor that takes you step by step from blank canvas to a masterpiece.  The best part is that you can take your drink of choice and a snack.  Now, you don't have to be a great artist to take these classes, they were made so anyone can follow along and paint in their own style.
I was lucky to go with my friend Corinne who appreciates art as much as I do.  I wish I took my camera so I could have taken a picture of us holding our paintings.  Here is a picture of the painting I made.

 The class instructor did a little introduction of herself and what they do in the studio.  I liked how she described the environment and compared it to what Bob Ross said,

“We don't make mistakes, just happy little accidents.”

 Love it! So I titled this post "Happy Little Accident"  because I had one of my own this week.  A long time ago I bought this wooden sign from Savers.  I didn't buy it because of what it said... something about golf being serious and not a game... don't quite remember exactly.  I bought it because I knew it would look great on my wall with a favorite quote.  So I took off the vinyl lettering and painted my wood black.

The edges were already sanded down so I decided to leave it that way and I am glad I did.

I used my Silhouette and some vinyl to cut out this really cool quote I found and placed it on top of the wood. I only used the vinyl as a stencil and painted the letters in white.  My happy mistake happened when I decided to use water to delude the white.  I was trying to go for a white-wash color against the black.

The water seeped under the vinyl and created a bleed effect on my letters.

When I peeled the vinyl off, this is what I saw.  My first thought was, "Oh no!  Now I have to paint over it again."  Then I remembered about happy mistakes.

So instead of doing it over I decided to just clean it up a bit.  Enough to where it still looks distressed but you can read what it says.  Then I wanted to add paint droplets.  I made sure they were around the main words, the ones I had made bold.  I added the droplets by dripping a brush soaked in watered down white paint.  Using a paper towel, I twisted a corner and like a pencil I lightly touched the droplets.  This sucked out most of the paint leaving behind a faint water droplet.  

  This was my finished project and I have to say that I LOVE my happy little accident!

Thanks for reading!

Making simple pillow cases

Hello everyone! When we got our sofas, they weren't the colors I wanted but who could refuse a really good price on two comfy sofas?
So I knew I would have to spend a little bit more in order to make them my own. Overall I did save myself a lot of money. I sat down and thought it through... well not really I stood in my living room and imagined how it would all come together. My husband must think I'm crazy for staring at the sofas and talking to myself. Hey, it really helps me concentrate.
My first step in approaching this big project was to start with the pillows. This will definitely be big for me because I have never reupholster a couch before so getting the little things out of the way seemed a good idea.
Thanks to Hobby Lobby (one of my favorite stores) I found these cute fabric patterns. Plus they were the right colors.

I grabbed the scissors and started cutting. Of course I measured the pillows first. I cut a square 16.5x16.5" and then two smaller pieces 10x16.5". I did this so I could make an envelope style pillow case. You can find plenty of tutorials online for this. I found mine through Brooke from All Things Thrifty. I wanted one side to be the chevron pattern and the other side the aqua, white, gray and black pattern.

Then I pinned the fabric together and started sewing.

I was able to make two pillow cases but need to do 2 or 3 more. I love how they turned out.

Thanks for reading!

Hot Air Balloon painting (sketch)

Okay Okay, I know I have not posted in awhile. I feel really bad about it because when I don't work on my blog, I don't get things done that I want done. Like my painting and other stuff I have started and never finish. The whole purpose of this blog is to help me create... and I love to create. When I don't create, I am not happy. So I jumped back in and told myself to not let this happen again.
It's funny how well my husband knows me because when I am not in a good mood he always asks if I started painting yet. That's him trying to tell me to go to my happy place. Last night when I started working on my pillow cases (which I am posting next)he noticed how happy I was because I was like a child. "Look at what I made! What do you think?! Do you like? huh, do you like it?" Now imagine me with a giddy face and pointing at my newest creation.

His answer is always, "Cool, it looks nice." I don't know how honest his reaction really is but I just think he is glad to see me happy.

You might ask..."So where is that painting you have talked about in past posts?" Well, it's sitting on top of my work table, staring back at me. You might have guessed that it's not finished and you are right. Shame on me. But I have made progress. My excuse is that I ran into a tiny problem. Tiny because it was an easy fix but it stopped me from going on further. So when I started sketching it on the canvas, I didn't like it. There was something that bothered me about it. So I stopped. A good friend of mine looked at it and gave me some suggestions. Thanks to her suggestions, I made the necessary changes and it looks great. All I need now is to add the paint.

I am looking forward to finishing this painting soon since it will be a gift to a best friend I have.

Thanks for reading!

Why buy a new clock?

I know I said I would show a canvas painting next but I wanted to share this clock project before I share the painting.

Since we moved to our new apartment, we had a very empty looking living room. We were waiting for money to start rolling in from my husband's new job before spending on a couch. In my search through Craig's list I found an awesome deal. I will tell you more about it in another post because this post will be dedicated to the free clock that came with the furniture. There are so many things I have been working on these last couple of weeks! Can't wait to share.

Now the clock looked fine just the way it was... but of course I had to change it. Lots of people like to go with the nice neutral colors and this clock would look awesome for that kind of living room. I promised myself that I would not do that. Now I can't do anything about the carpet and wall color. When you are renting, your options are somewhat limited in that department. SO I am letting my furniture and accents to set the mood. This is what happened to that nice clock.

For those who know me, the aqua blue colored clock is more my style.

I first started by taking it apart. Then I picked one of my favorite colors, Blue Bahama from Patio Paint.

Once I covered all the areas I wanted covered, I let it dry overnight.

Then I went into my Silhouette program and cut out some vinyl numbers.

I made sure they were in the right place and started painting in the numbers with a grayish-silver color. I just mixed some black, white and silver paint.

But then of course I couldn't leave it without some embellishment.

On my wall it went! It ties in well with all the other decorations. I know that this picture doesn't show them but I will be revealing my living room in some near future. For now you will get little glimpses.

Super awesome sewing machine cover

I am no sewing expert and I have a very long ways to go. The only way to get better is to practice. I thought about all the fun things I need done and will be good for practicing. The top one on my list was a sewing machine cover. My machine used to belong to my grandma before she left and decided to hand it down to me. For the longest time (we're talking years) it sat in my parent's garage collecting dust. There was no cover or instruction manual with it when my Dad brought it to me last year. So of course it just sat in my apartment collecting more dust. By then I was learning about home decor and wanted to learn how to sew.

When I started taking my sewing class, my teacher noticed how bad the poor sewing machine sounded. It had obviously not been cleaned or oiled for a long time. She suggested that I either get a cover for it or make one. So after cleaning and oiling it (and a few months later), grammie's machine finally has a cover!



This project was made out of scrap pieces of fabric. Leftovers from other stuff that I made.


Fabric is expensive so I wanted to get my money's worth. I also had these cute buttons from Joann Fabrics.


Added some love...


Also added a pocket in the back with more love, lots more.



Yes, it's not perfect but I gave it a try and I like it for now.

For my next project I plan to go back to painting. I haven't done any painting posts lately and I need to. See this blank canvas?

It's just begging for something amazing.