GOLD LEAF-ISH IKEA TABLES........So Chic!

We all have them!  The IKEA LACK TABLE and there are endless possibilities on how to use them. This is one of my favorites.  BTW, every once in a while they go on sale for 8 dollars. Can't beat that with a stick!  This project involves my recent trip to Chinatown where I stocked up on some beautiful Chinese papers which are traditionally burned.  My Chinese friends are always a bit wary of my use of these papers so I truly hope I’m not offending anyone.  If I am, my sincere apologies.

We all have them!  The IKEA LACK TABLE and there are endless possibilities on how to use them. This is one of my favorites.  BTW, every once in a while they go on sale for 8 dollars. Can't beat that with a stick!  This project involves my recent trip to Chinatown where I stocked up on some beautiful Chinese papers which are traditionally burned.  My Chinese friends are always a bit wary of my use of these papers so I truly hope I’m not offending anyone.  If I am, my sincere apologies.

YOU’LL NEED

Chinese Tea Paper or Joss Paper (Check out PearlRiver.Com)

Elmer’s glue

1” wide paintbrush

IKEA Parsons table

Scissors

Sandpaper or sanding block

Old magazine

Minwax Polycrylic Protective Coating

HERE’S HOW

Start by cutting off the excess paper from your Joss papers because you won’t need it.

Lightly sand your parsons table so that it has some tooth for the glue to stick

Slightly water down your Elmer’s glue in a cup or plate so that it spreads easily.  Depending on how much I squeeze out to work with, if you just ad a few drops at a time until you get a good consistency you’ll be fine.  You can always add more glue if it gets runny.

Put the gold leaf paper on a page of the magazine and spread the glue on the back with your paintbrush and place it on the table.

  Continue to do this until the entire table is covered with the gold leaf paper.

 After the entire table is covered and the glue is dry, cover your table with the Minxax Polycrylic Protective Coating to give it a nice finish.

Make more than one and create a terrific long beautiful coffee table for your living room!

THIS PROJECT AND OVER 100 MORE IS FROM 

THE BIG ASS BOOK OF HOME DECOR! 

Butterfly Doodle Pillow.....

Seriously, is there a better word that DOODLE? 

And who doesn't love butterflies.

Gotta say, a Butterfly Doodle Pillow seems like something from heaven.

 

YOU’LL NEED:

Sewing machine (love my BERNINA!)

Black thread

Enlarged image of a butterfly, dragonfly, whatever rocks your world.  My image is from a Dover Clip Art book. 

Light box 

HINT: If you don’t have a light box use a lamp under a glass table or a window

1/2 yard white fabric and 1/2 yard black fabric

Pencil

Iron and ironing board

Sewing needle

Pillow stuffing

HERE’S HOW:

1.Enlarge your image on a copy machine (head over to Staples, they have the best copy department and they are nicely priced).

2. Place your image under your white fabric.

3. Using your pencil, lightly trace your image on to the fabric keeping in mind that each line you make will be covered in thread.

4. With your sewing machine, slowly go over each penciled line with a straight stitch.

HINT:  To make your darker areas more interesting, go over them with a zigzag stitch to get more thread on the fabric.

DON’T WORRY!  You can always add more if it’s not quite right.  It’s just thread and fabric.

5. When you’re finished,  iron your piece

6. Cut a piece of black fabric for the back of the pillow

7. Sew the right sides together and leave a 4” hole for stuffing.

8. Clip your corners at an angle and turn inside out.

9. Fill with stuffing and stitch closed with a sewing needle.

 FOR THIS PROJECT AND 100 MORE CHECK OUT

THE BIG ASS BOOK OF HOME DECOR!

TABLE THAT! GLASS TOPPED TABLE

     

You’ve seen those coffee tables at the thrift store with the horrible tops. You know the ones that have cigarette burns on them and the wood is in terrible condition.  Well, take a look under that table top and check out the base.  Chances are it’s in darn good condition and only needs a new top.  I got this coffee table for 5 bucks and the glass for another 15 dollars straight off of another table right next to it.  It was a marriage made in  living room heaven.  I’d say a 20 dollar coffee table is pretty good!

YOU’LL NEED:

A thrift store coffee table with great legs that are attached to a base

Glass top (if you can’t find one with another ugly coffee table then just head over to your local glass cutter and have one made to size.  Pier One also sells round versions.

KRYLON high gloss spray paint

KRYLON paint pen in 18K gold

Plastic furniture no slip dots

Screwdriver

Sandpaper

Dust rags

 HERE’S HOW

1.     Using your screwdriver, remove the table top from the table base.

2.     Sand your table base to get it in great shape for painting.

3.     Dust off the base with your dust rags.

4.     Give your base several coats of spray paint letting it dry about 10 minutes in between coats.

5.     When the paint is dry, take your gold enamel pen and go along the edges to create accents.

6.     Place your plastic dots and stick them to the corners of the table.

7.     Place the glass no slip dots on the table where your glass will be resting.

8.     Place the glass on top and pile on the books and bric-a-brac and you're done.

For this and over 100 more home decor ideas, check out

THE BIG ASS BOOK OF HOME DECOR!

FORNASETTI-esque TABLE DIY

I've always loved Piero Fornasetti's work.  Sadly, it's just too expensive for me to buy so I've created a table in homage to him.  By the way, it looks great in my guest room!  The biggest challenge

was to find a way to make metallic images to apply to furniture.  This table isn’t just about decoupage, folks….This is about finding new ways to do it!  My first failure was spray painting copy paper with gold spray paint and running it through a copy machine.  Boy did I get in trouble for that one!  My next few attempts were just as unsuccessful.  Then one day I realized that you can copy on clear acetate paper.  The light bulb went off and so did I!

YOU’LL NEED:

Images that you want to adhere to a table

Table in need of an overhaul

Elmer’s White Glue

1” wide paintbrush

Black high gloss Krylon Fusion spray paint

Copy center that makes acetate copies

Metallic gold Krylon spray paint

Minwax Polycrylic Protective Finish in high gloss

2” wide latex brush

HERE’S HOW

1. Spray paint your table with the high gloss black paint.

2. Copy your images at the copy center on clear acetate paper.

3.  Spray paint the entire page in the metallic gold spray paint.

4.   Cut out your images after the metallic paint is dry.

    

5.  Experiment with your images and figure out where you want them to be placed.

6.  Paint the metallic side of the image with glue and adhere it to the table.

7. Continue this until the entire table is covered the way you want it.

8. After the images dry for a few hours, cover your entire table in the
Minwax Polycrylic Protective Finish with your 2” wide latex brush.

 For an extra special touch, take a Krylon Gold Painter's Pen and edge the table.

For this project and 100 more, grab a copy of 

THE BIG ASS BOOK OF HOME DECOR

And the winner is.............

JUNE @ I WILL CRAFT!

Congratulations June!

You win a book and all of the colors of Glitter Blast from Krylon.

GLITTER BLAST TUESDAY!

Is it really GLITTER BLAST TUESDAY ALREADY?
It's time for you to enter to win a set of GLITTER BLAST spray paints with an ongoing contest every other Tuesday from here on out!  Rock on Krylon!

Winners not only get my NEW book,
THE BIG ASS BOOK OF CRAFTS 2,
they will get all of the colors of glitter blast sent right to their front door.
 Just a few simple rules to enter.

GOOD LUCK!

And may the glitter be with you....

RULES
1. SHARE this on your FB page (by pressing SHARE)

2.  LIKE and COMMENT on the KRYLON FB page that I sent you!

KRYLON LINK

3. LIKE and COMMENT on my fan page that your entering the contest.

MY FAN PAGE LINK

4.  JOIN my blog if you haven't.

5.  LIKE my BIG ASS BOOK OF CRAFTS 2 on Amazon.com

THE BIG ASS LINK

6.  COMMENT here that you've done it AND what your favorite spray paint project is.

6. Join me on TWITTER if you haven't.
TWITTER LINK

Keep an eye out for the winner.  I'll post it here and on my FB page.  

It helps if you can leave a way for me to contact you, too!

Masquerade Mask from PULP FICTION: PERFECT PAPER PROJECTS

 

MASQUERADE MASK WITH FEATHERS

I love masks.  There is nothing more fun than showing up at a costume party and hanging out with people who don’t know it’s you. Well, they don't know it's me until I laugh....that's always a dead giveaway.  I love the simplicity and elegance of this mask and the fact that it can be made from things you probably already have in your craft stash.

YOU’LL NEED:

Cardboard

Elmer’s Glue

Book pages

4 feet of ribbon of your choice

Small gage wire and wire cutters

Rhinestones

Hole punch

1 yard of trim

Hot glue and glue gun

X-Acto knife

Scissors

Hot glue gun and glue sticks

Mod Podge Gloss

1. Cut out the mask pattern in cardboard and slightly bend in a curve.  Try it on your face for size and comfort.

 

2.  Using Elmer’s glue that’s been watered down a little bit, glue pieces of book pages to the front and back of the mask.  Since the mask will be a tiny bit wet from the glue now is the time to decide exactly what shape you want it to have.

 3.Cut out the shapes for the eyes.

 

4. When dry, hot glue your trim around the mask and the eyes.

 5.  For the each feather you will take one book page and fold it in half.

 6. Spread a layer of Elmer’s glue on one half.

7.  Insert a 8” piece of wire in between the pages and seal it in between and let dry.

 8.  When fully dry, cut out your feather shape and carefully cut the feather as shown

 9.  Position the feathers on the center of the mask and hot glue in place.

 10. When the feathers are in place and dry,  bend them into shape.

 11. Using your hot glue gun, glue on the rhinestones.

 

12.  Put a hole punch on the corners of your mask.

 13. String the ribbon through and tie a knot if you want.

Now, in the 2nd edition there is another version included.
  PULP FICTION: PERFECT PAPER PROJECTS 2ND EDITION 

Pins and tacks...

A stroll down memory lane today with projects from books gone by..........

 

SEQUIN CANDLES MADE FROM BALL POINT PINS AND LARGE 1/2" SEQUINS

 There's just something about a T-pin, push pin, ball point pin or thumbtack that just makes me want to create.  I dig ball point pins because of the the colors and they just make sewing more fun.  I like thumbtacks because they're shiny and you can get 250 for 99c AND they come in gold and silver.  Mostly I like them because they are perfect in their design.  These projects are to inspire and all come from my book Dollar Store Decor.  This was one of the first books I wrote and as I've grown as a designer I've used these techniques as starting points for many other projects.  I  hope they spark your creativity.

CABINET DOORS IN MY NEW YORK CITY APARTMENT. Since I couldn't leave the white cabinets alone and I didn't have a lot of cash,  I painted all the cabinets this dark green and went to town with the thumbtacks.  I got the brass handles at the 99c store, too by the way.  It was a project which cost in total about 12 dollars.  The neighbors weren't too happy with me since I do my best work at night.  

THUMBTACK TABLE:  This table was left over from a shoot from Cosmo Girl! Magazine when I was an editor there so I used the silver thumbtacks to spruce it up a bit.  I would be much more adventurous now though.  I might even paint a pattern on it and then surround it with the tacks?  Who knows?  I'm curious to know what you would do?

 THUMBTACK HEADBOARD:  This project couldn't be any easier.  You can either embellish an existing headboard with a design of your choosing OR you could cover a piece of plywood with batting and fabric and then go nuts with the thumbtacks.  Either way, they add a little sparkle to a room, don't you think?

Why not try really clustering them together in a shape?  I think that could be really fun!  Just make sure to use some needle nose pliers to hold them in place first.  This way you won't get a sore thumb. 

ZIPPER PUMP!

ZIPPER PUMP

Zippers have made their way in to fashion and I don’t think they are going anyway for a while.  But WAIT!  You don’t have to make this project with zippers, you could use a cool trim, lace or a strip of fabric, even some chain.  Think about it and whip out that E-6000.  You can do it!

YOU’LL NEED:

E-6000 glue

Toothpick

Metal zippers

Clothespins

Hot glue gun and glue sticks

Pair of pumps

HERE’S HOW:

1.    Take 10” of zipper and roll it like a cinnamon bun running a line of hot glue as you roll it.

2.    Using a generous amount of your E-6000, glue it to the front of your shoe.

3.    Use your glue gun to lightly tack two layers of the zipper on all the way around the shoe down to the flower.

4.    Squeeze in the E-6000 in between where you tacked and put a clothespin on it so it makes a very nice bond.

5.    Go out and strut your stuff!

Check out these shoe Re-do projects below!

Check out this shoe make-over with Kelly Nishimoto!

And this shoe make-over with Kristen from Glitter-N-Glue!

From boring to a HOOT with this Owl Flat DIY shoe Re-do!