Three Sides

Hey Monday!  I’m not exactly happy you’re here considering you mark the end of vacation.  But, I’ll get over it with a super easy post about these curtains I made for Sebastian’s room.

I made his closet curtains out of a queen-size sheet, cut in half and hemmed.  The window curtains I made out of some white duck fabric from Hobby Lobby.  To keep things from getting too plain with all that white, I stenciled on some tiny triangles.

Here’s how I did it.

First, I made my stencil.  Using the Rhonna Designs app on my phone, I stuck a little triangle onto a white background and sized it to the size I wanted the triangles to appear on the fabric.  Then I laid some stencil plastic (leftover from stenciling this rug) over the top of my phone and traced the triangle.  I traced two because my cousin was here to help.  Hooray for company and help!
 

Then I pulled out these foam pouncers (affiliate link), originally purchased way back when I dotted these jeans, and squirted a little bit of black acrylic paint onto a plate. 
I didn’t add any fabric medium to the paint because I know it’ll still be permanent even though it might not be as soft.  On curtains, I’m not worried about the feel.  Clothing is a little different.

Next, I put a small amount of paint onto the pouncer and dabbed that paint right over my stencil.  Note:  Use enough paint to just cover the surface of your foam.  A nice thin coat dabbed a few times over the stencil will do the trick without bleeding.  Too much paint will get under the stencil and give you some crazy lines and a not-so-crisp shape.  You might have to dab the plate a few times after you get paint on the pouncer to get some of that extra paint off.

We just placed triangles in random places, scattered over the curtains.  The more imperfectly placed, the better, in this case.
 

I love the triangles vs. regular old dots because I feel like they’re a little more manly for our little man.  Sharp edges and nice straight sides…in other words, tall, dark, and handsome.  Or maybe that’s a stretch but either way, you catch my drift.  :)

Anyway…

Have a great Monday!  I’m feeling the usual ‘overwhelmed’ at all the to-do’s I really want to get done this week and the fact that we’ve been on vacation for the better part of the past week and a half is making that hefty load even heftier.  It’s okay though, usually come Tuesday, I realize that I can’t be a one-woman show and I hack my list in half.  Happens every week.  Vicious circle or sensibility shot?  Not sure…

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So easy you might as well do it…and pin it for when you do.  :)

How To Make Your Own Stencil

Well then, let’s get right back to regular programming, shall we?  Specifically, the how-to on the stencil I made for our new entry way rug.

I got the inspiration for this pattern via this rug I found on Pinterest:

[Link from Pinterest done broke so if anybody knows the original source, lemme know.]

The first thing I had to do was create the design from the rug on my comp to be printed out and turned into stencil form.  To do that, I put together the basic design in Pixlr (my favorite, free online photo-editing program).  It’s a little difficult to explain that process but basically I pulled the most basic part from the design which, in this case, was a large circle encompassing a square with notched-out corners that were connected by lines.  (Did I lose ya there?  It’s okay because I’ve saved you from all that leg work by including a free download to the design below so you can skip-to-my-lou right over it all this mumbo jumbo if you’d like.)  I had to pay close attention to the x and y values in my Pixlr document to make sure everything was centered and equal but once again, don’t worry if that’s completely foreign.  Once I had the basic circle and square shapes aligned, I copied and pasted the design multiple times in a row to reflect the entire pattern in order to draw in those lines that connected the squares.  This is what the design looked like after that:

I didn’t connect all the squares because all I needed was one circle to make my design but you get the point.

To get the design for my stencil, I simply cropped the above image down to this:

And, like I said, the good news is that you don’t have to understand or like any of that because you can download the design below, free and clear.

So, the stencil.  (P.S. This method will work for almost any kind of shape and design you want to turn into a stencil.)  To get it from computer to plastic I first had to print it out.  The only way I could get it to print at the size I wanted and without it being adjusted to “fit the page” was to open the .jpg in Microsoft’s Paint.  Using the ruler in Paint as my guide, I sized it until it was as big as I wanted it and hit print.  Using paint allowed me to print so that the design would print at it’s original size which, in my case, utilized four sheets of paper.
  

Once printed, I had to cut off all the extra paper surrounding the design.  To do this I used a ruler to draw lines at the designs edges and then I cut along the lines.

First grade difficulty level here folks.


Then I taped the four sheets together to get the design in one piece.


At this point I realized that I wanted my whole design a little thicker so I widened the lines by drawing around them with a sharpie.

If you download the design for yourself, you might want yours thicker too or you may not.  Whatever cooks your dinner I say.  If you do, a marker will help you get there.

The last thing I did was cut my design in half.  I found the halfway point by folding the design in half and holding it up to the light to make sure both sides looked like one side/on top of each other.  Got it?  Super scientific over here.  Somebody call Bill Nye.
The reason I cut the design in half was because the whole design was a little too large to fit on the stencil blank I found at Hobby Lobby.  My entire design measured 13.5 inches in diameter but the stencil plastic only measured 18 x 12 inches.  While painting the design onto my rug, I worked by stenciling half of the design at a time, flipping the stencil around each time to do each half. 

To get the stencil onto the plastic I taped the paper design upside-down onto my it.


Then I flipped the whole thing over so that the paper was underneath the plastic and I traced the design onto the plastic using a sharpie.  (You might notice the design in the picture below shows the white lines throughout the black design whereas they’re missing above.  I painted those in after I realized I’d need them to hold the different parts of my design together in the plastic.  The download includes them so you won’t have to worry about them if you use my stencil.)

(Also, I drew the intersecting diagonal lines in the middle of the stencil to help me determine the very center of the stencil.  I used that point while centering the stencil on the rug by placing it right over the center mark of my rug.)

Once I had the entire design traced onto the plastic, I simply cut it out with a craft knife.  I have this Westcott one (affliliate link) and really like it because it has a cushioned grip.  I used a ruler to cut along the lines to make sure they were nice and straight.


And that’s it!  Here’s my stencil all ready to go:


While I was cutting out the stencil I realized that it had a plastic film over one side so I removed it before I started stenciling.  At first I thought it was covering an adhesive but it wasn’t and the package didn’t say anything about it so it’s function is unknown to me.  Enlighten me if you know.

So that’s how I made my very own stencil.  You can get the tutorial on how I painted it onto our entry rug by clicking here.  It might seem like a rather tedious and challenging project but I promise you, it’s really not as hard as it may seem.  If you can trace and cut along lines, you can do this! 

Cost?  Under two bucks.  I bought this stenciling plastic at Hobby Lobby for $2.50 ($3.99 with a 40% off coupon) but the package came with three sheets of plastic so I’ve got two more to file away for future stencils.  In case you don’t have a Hobby Lobby close by, here are a few affiliate links to some stenciling blanks I found on Amazon:
 Set of three 12 x 8 in. stencils
Set of two 18 x 10 in. stencils

Last, here is are the downloads of my stencil in case you want to use it:
Click here to download the whole design.
Click here to download half the design (what I used).

Per the usual, please let me know if you have any questions!  If you use my stencil or use my tutorial to make your own stencil, leave a link in the comments, on our Facebook page, or you can send me an email or tag me in a gram!  I’d love to see what you do with it!

Have a great rest of the week!  I’ll be working on this:

All the details to come.  Until then, say a prayer for me.  I’m positive that my time in purgatory will be spent sanding.  :/ 

Just Say ‘Yes’ to Rugs

I have a “figure it out” personality, also known as an “if you can’t afford it/it’s too expensive, make it yourself” personality.  You might’ve guessed that if you’ve been reading my blog for longer than a month.  That’s how this project came along…and pretty much every other project over here too.  I wanted a bigger rug with a cool geometric pattern in front of the door in our entry way but the budget wouldn’t give me much to work with.  So I made one and it only cost me $7.  Yep.  Only seven bucks.  Here’s the story.

Supplies:
*rug (mine measures 3 x 4)
*stencil
*paint (I used latex paint)
*foam pouncer/stenciling sponge or stipple brush (I used one of these <- and that there is an affiliate link fyi)
*plate for paint
*tape

First, I made my own stencil.  I’ll detail how I did that in another post lest I stretch this one to novel status.  I started my stenciling in the center of the rug and worked my way out so that the entire design would be centered over the expanse of the rug.  To find the center, I laid two tape measures across the rug; one diagonally from one corner to the opposite and the other diagonally between the other two corners.  Where they intersected was the middle (I’m smarter than a first grader!).  I had already marked a center point on my stencil so I just laid the center of the stencil right over the center of the rug.  To make sure that my stencil was straight, I measured the distance of each end of the square pattern on the stencil to the end of the rug and when they were equi-distant, I taped down the stencil.

Next up was painting.  Before I started, I watered down the paint so that it was a tad more runny and would soak down into the rug a little better.  I didn’t add much water though, maybe one part water to eight parts paint.  Then I poured some paint on a plate and went along dabbing my sponge into some paint and then sponging along the stencil.

As I went along I made sure to hold down the stencil with my free hand as I sponged with the other for a little added support.  The stencil I made had to be turned around/flipped over to produce a full circle/square design like so:

All I had to do was line up the edges of the just-painted design with the stencil and continue sponging away.  Then I continued flipping the stencil until I had stenciled the entire rug.

When all the stenciling was finished, I wanted to fill in all the small lines throughout the pattern created from the stencil (their purpose was to hold the stencil together but more on that in the actual stencil-making tutorial).  It’s not necessary to fill these in but I was going for more of a cohesive look so I did.  With a flat paintbrush, I just went around and painted over the lines and filled in some imperfect spots like some of the areas where the stencils met.  So, it went from this:

to this:

It might seem a little tedious but it only took me about 15 minutes and, if you’re like me and need a little mindless work to suck you out of the daily humdrum, it’s therapeutical.  :)

The only lines I didn’t go over and fill in were the ones at the intersection of all the circles in the pattern.  Over those I placed a simple square stencil and painted right over them.

Here’s what the whole rug looks like finished:

Sooo, let me deviate a little and tell you it’s cool and I love it but it’s not exactly what I was going for.  The lines connecting the squares were actually supposed to be straight.  The aqua lines in the pic below show what I mean.

In order for them to be straight, I should’ve laid my stencil out the same way each time like this:

But instead I laid it out like this…
…not realizing until I was halfway done that I was going to have a variation from what I initially wanted.  Does that make sense?  Luckily, it doesn’t look bad because there was no turning back.  I’m only writing this out in case you try this very stencil.  Lay your stencil out the same way each time (width-wise every time or length-wise every time) unless you’d prefer the accidental variation which is perfectly fine too.  :)

The last thing I did to the rug was add a non-slip drawer liner to the back.  The girls run past the entry way area a thousand times a day and the plastic backing of this rug made it slide all over the place.  Running toddlers and a slip ‘n slide rug make for surefire accidents.  So, I simply cut a couple of rolls of liner up so that I c0uld fit three strips along the back of the rug and attached them with some liquid nails like so:

I let the glue dry for 24 hours before setting the rug down and away we/they went.  It ain’t going nowhere and trips to the ER for brick floor collisions we will hopefully never have…or at least they won’t be caused by a sliding rug.

[Sources and/or tutorials for –> the globe chandelier, the hook system, the roman shade, and the mirror.]

Cost breakdown:
Rug:  $5 (Old Time Pottery on sale from $7)
Paint:  free (Lowe’s with a free paint sample coupon from Real Simple mag – color is Cathedral Stone by Valspar)
Foam Pouncer:  already had (Martha Stewart from Michaels – came in a pack of seven and purchased last year with a coupon for this project)
Rubber drawer liner for backing:  $2 (Dollar Store)
Tape:  already had
Total:  $7

[BTdubs…if making your own stencil doesn’t sound fun, you can find some fairly cheap wall stencils at Hobby Lobby that’ll run you back about $10 with a coupon or there’s always Royal Design Studio where you can find tons of amazing stencils with a little higher price tag.  Also, Target has some flatwoven kitchen rugs that just happen to be blank on the opposite side and perfect for stenciling/painting (not listed online).  My original plan was to sew a few of them together for an entry rug but then I scored the one I used at OTP.]

Here’s the view from the hallway:

[Frame collage tutorial here.]

And a good ‘ole before and after/progress:

Don’t forget, like I mentioned above, I’ve got a whole tutorial coming on how to make your very own stencil (mine cost me about $1 to make!!!) and I’ll include a free download if you want to attempt this one.  :D 

Have a great week!

Anthro-Inspired Knobs

>>> DON’T FORGET TO ENTER OUR CRAFTING TOOL GIVEAWAY!  TODAY IS THE VERY LAST DAY!  THE LUCKY WINNER WILL BE ANNOUNCED TOMORROW!  <<<

We put knobs on the cabinets in our laundry room.  A boring woo-hoo, right? 
[Left was then; right is now…just to clarify in case the change is too teensy to notice.]

But hold up, they’re not just any knobs.  Nope.  They’re knock-offs inspired by Anthropologie that I spent a small sliver of everyday last week crafting.

 
Theirs are just to-die-for/swoon/can-I-marry-them gorgeous, aren’t they?  The $14 price tag, not so much.  Had we purchased these for our laundry room, our back account would’ve been set back a hefty $84 (six knobs) not including tax and shipping.  Mine cost me $3.  Bean for the win!

Here’s what they looked like before I got all snazzy on ‘em: 
I have actually been wanting to put some knobs on those cabinets for some time because they just get so finger-printed and dirty so I headed out to our local ReStore one day awhile ago and snatched up six of these shiny gold knobs.  I could’ve gone gold with them to get Anthropologie’s look even more, and boy did I want to, but I  just didn’t want the gold to clash with the big chrome rings on our washer and dryer.  I mean, I’m all about mixing metals but this is one time I went matching.  So, silver they became.  

My first step was covering up the gold and getting them all nice and prepped for paint with a few coats of white primer (Rustoleum).

I made sure to leave the screws in the back to keep the paint from getting in and clogging up the hole back there.

Once they were nice and dry, I flipped them onto their faces since I didn’t need silver paint there and sprayed the stems and backs with some Rustoleum silver metallic spray paint.
I used the chrome silver, not the brushed silver, but I’ve found that there’s really not that much of a difference between the two.  The chrome is unfortunately not as chrome as the cap of the can would have you believe.  :( 

So after the silver was even and dry, I taped off the faces of each knob and took them back outside where I sprayed them with some plain white spray paint (Rustoleum…again).

After I sprayed the faces white, I let them dry and made sure to leave the tape on (usually I’d take it off right away to prevent peeling but since the coat of white was so thin, I had no problem with it) because next up was…
 
Yep, nail polish!  After a search through the Martha Stewart specialty paint at Home Depot left me hanging for pearl paint, I did some brainstorming and dug through my polish where I found this pearl color by NailSlicks.  I’ve never used nail polish in DIY and I wasn’t sure if it’d work but there’s a first time for everything, right?

Well, it worked and it worked well.  Here are the knobs after I painted their faces with my pearl nail polish:
It’s a little hard to see in the above picture (I was lazy and used my iPhone for pictures) but they’re not perfect; the coat isn’t smooth and even.  But, that’s exactly what I needed considering the pearl on the Anthropologie knobs is laid in squares and not one smooth layer.  The nail polish was a little difficult to paint as it dried quick, making my desire for the imperfection in it all a little easier actually.  All I did was paint diagonal lines out from the center of each knob.  Here’s a closer look:

Also, I took the tape off each knob as I went because I was afraid, had I left all the tape on until I was done, it’d take the thicker nail polish layer off with it.

Next up, the design.  First I made myself a little stencil…I’m no good at drawing perfect shapes freehand.  Oh no, give me a roller and I’ll paint big Ws on a wall but perfect circles and squares you will not get.  Plus, from here on out there were to be no mess-ups or all would be lost.
  So, I actually just traced the design from the Anthro knob from computer screen to a small piece of wax paper, cut it out, centered it over my knob, and traced it on very lightly with a pencil. 

Then I used a silver sharpie (which I made sure matched the color of the spray paint before I started) to permanently draw on my design. 

Here they are, all designed!!

Last, I spray each knob with several coats of the same spray lacquer I used on the knobs in the girls’ room to give them a nice glossy finish.  This part was a little disappointing.  I found that the lacquer dulled the silver a little and really didn’t even make it that glossy.  The faces of each knob were a little glossier after finished but not what I had in mind.  Either way, the knobs had a nice coat of protection and were ready for use.

So pretty, no?
 

Back-tracking a little here…to figure out where I wanted the knobs placed on each door, I googled “where to install knobs on cabinets” and got my friend Lauren to send me a picture of the knobs in their kitchen.  The general consensus was that the edges should be 1/4 to 1/2 inch away from the edges of the door.  After I did some measuring and marking, I cut out some circles the same size as my knobs from a piece of paper and stuck them on the cabinets to see the placement before the holes were drilled.  Fake paper knobs:

Later, after all the knobs were ready to be up and functioning and I was happy with their future placement after staring at the fake paper knobs for a few days, my main man got out his drill and drilled six holes.  And that was that.

    

So, in the end I only shoveled picked out $3 for this entire project because I had everything on hand but the knobs.  If you had to buy everything for this project (somebody puh-lease make them in gold…pllllease!!), you’re looking at around $20+ (primer, silver, and white spray paint, tape, pearl nail polish or some sort of pearl paint, a silver sharpie, tape, and thrifted knobs) but you’ll have loads of supplies left over at the end to be used for other things.  So, when all is said and done, it’s a pretty cheap project…especially when you think about how much you’re saving by making your own version vs. buying the real things.  :)




So, anybody else DIY-ed some knobs out there?  What about knocked-off an Anthropologie or upscale object/design to save some cash but still get the look?  Or maybe you just save up/splurge for the real thing?  Either way, it’s fun to get some character up in herrr, no?

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Someone say party?!  Yep, I’m cruisin’ in from March 2014 and linking up with East Coast Creative for their week of knock-offs!  Click over to see some pretty amazing knock-offs!