Door Update!

My beautifully painted new old door!

Click on the door to see the original post!

Bowled Over with Inspiration

A while back, I was perusing Pintrest and came across a novel idea—tiled bowling ball garden ornaments. This looked pretty neat to me and I thought it might be a good project I could do with my kiddo.

So last summer we shopped garage sales and thrift stores for an old bowling ball (only $3) and colored dishes. Family members donated to the cause, giving us their old chipped and unwanted dishes—Sis even gave us some lovely iridescent purple glass beads that adorned the tables at her wedding reception! To top it off, my MIL found a nice gazing ball stand at a garden center that she picked up for me!

Here's Big Goonie aka Bill with our bowling ball. We've taken a Sharpie and drawn some swirly lines on it on which to put our glue (heavy duty construction adhesive) and adhere our glass beads.

Bill helped me smash some dishes on the sidewalk, covered with an old towel. We decided to put purple glass beads on the swirls, turquoise tile pieces on the third top of the ball, green in the middle, and yellow at the bottom third.

Here's our supplies, neatly placed in dishes that will one day become part of another project!

Tiling is going well!

Still a work in progress, but too excited about our progress to not share the project!

And this is where we're at! Just a little more tiling to go! Thank goodness I have another matching green bowl—we're going to need it! I found some ivory grout at Habitat for Humanity for just a couple of bucks. Might have preferred white, but I think it will do! Stay tuned for the final reveal!

When One Door Shuts, Another Opens

“Look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else.”

― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

I live in a Colonial-style home that was built in 1925. The doors in my home are from the 20s with glass door knobs and heavy brass hinges. They are lovely—all except one door, that is.

The door leading to the basement/laundry area is the abnormal one. It is a hollow-core door with peeling laminate from decades gone by and I positively hate it. For a while now it has been my goal to one day change out this door to match the others in my home.

The door to the basement. YUCK!

One day, about a year ago, my neighbor (who had done extensive renovations on her home prior to moving in a few years ago) happened to mention that she had a door that matched mine laying in the rafters of her garage that I was welcome to have. I couldn't believe my luck! It was the perfect size! And it was already stripped of all of its years of paint! I rushed it home before she could change her mind! :)

The new old door! In this shot you can see I've been doing some repairs—wood glue here and there as well as wood filler in spots.

The door leaned against my kitchen wall for a year until I was finally ready to install it. I've never done this before! It took me a while to work up the nerve and sort out my plan as to how I was going to do this, after all, this was the only antique door I had on hand—no room for error!

In the meantime, I scoured antique stores looking for hinges that matched the ones throughout my house. I picked up these beauties for a couple of bucks! I also picked up a new antique-style doorknob set for the door at Lowes. Now I had all of my parts! Let's get to work!

The paint was on thick and cracked and came off without much encouragement.

Woohoo! A stripped hinge!

And... VOILA!! My new old door to the basement! I did it!! I am so pleased with it!! It even has a lock—THAT WORKS! So exciting... Now I just need to take it back down and get it painted.

My new old door to the basement with gorgeous glass door knobs and working lock!

For a future project, I've got that wretched paneling in my crosshairs... stay tuned...

It's Not Easy Being Green...

There's so many different shades to choose from!

Sis decided it was time to update her kitchen. In fact, a few weeks ago, she and Handy Hubs got a little crazy and painted all of their kitchen cabinets (you'll see this in the reveal down below)!

Kitchen cabinets before

Kitchen before

During my most recent visit, she decided it was time to update the wall color as well. The green that was in there was a taupe-ish camouflage green. She wanted something cheerier. We brought home four samples before we settled on our final choice.

Here you can see some of our sample colors. Sis has taped off the woodwork and I have started to cut in the edges. This is going to look good!

And... VOILA! White kitchen cabinets with fresh green walls. Beautiful!

Let There Be Light!

My kid and I traveled to see my sister for a short visit. As usual, Sis had a long list of tasks that she wanted to accomplish—many of which my expertise would come in handy for!

One item to address were the sconces above her fireplace—they don't particularly go with her decor. We decided to paint them until she is able to find something she likes even better.

Before

After

Perhaps they'll find their way to my house once she finds something more to her liking?

The Fairest of Them All

Our school is putting on the play "The Rockin' Tale of Snow White" later this week, and I have been tasked with making the crown for the wicked queen. The director told me she wanted it to have lots of spikes!

I scoured the internet for an inspiration crown. I found a site where someone else had made one out of Styrene that reminiscent of the crown worn by the queen in the recent hit movie "Snow White and the Huntsman".

Pics I found of someone building a crown from styrene

Wicked queen from "Snow White and the Huntsman"

I didn't have any Styrene handy, but I did have access to heavy paper! The paper I have is heavier than card stock, but lighter than chip board. I think it will be perfect!

Figuring out the right size for the ring of triangles that the spikes will set into later.

First I used a regular sheet of white paper to make a small pattern and get an idea of the size I wanted my shapes to be. Once I got my template made, I traced my shape on my heavier paper, cut out the pieces, scored them, and gently folded them.

Left and right triangle pieces waiting to be taped together.

I taped my scored shapes together with white duct tape. Then I cut a little notch in the bottom of the taped shape so it would sit on the head ring in the appropriate spot. Once I had all of my triangles sitting on the ring evenly spaced, I glued them to the head ring.

Ring of triangles adhered to the head ring.

Now it's time for the spikes. After some measuring, scoring, folding, and trimming, I had a shape that I was ready to adhere to my triangles.

And... VOILA! Here's where we're at for now! Now to strengthen it up and get it painted!

UPDATE:
I wanted to seal the seams where there were gaps between the pieces of paper, so I decided to decoupage tissue paper to outside of the crown. I thought this would also lend some texture to the crown so that the pewter effect would be more apparent after being applied.

After the decoupage had dried, I painted the crown a silver grey color. Much to my horror the crown looked like it was made of tin foil! I have worked too hard on this crown for it to look like it was constructed of tin foil! On to "Plan B"!!

Plan B consists of repainting the whole crown black and applying black glitter. I also have some silver glitter spray that I intend to use to highlight some of the various shapes, like the "V's" that the spikes fit into.

So this is where we're at tonight. Need to finish this up by tomorrow! It's needed by Wednesday morning!


YET ANOTHER UPDATE:
And... VOILA! Here's the finished crown!

I doused it in black glitter and barely sprayed a silver glitter paint over the smaller V's so that the audience would be able to see some definition from afar. It turned out pretty good, I think! And it lasted all three performances without being damaged (thank goodness!)!