Trash to treasure Tuesday. or just practicing...

My good Friends, Kari and Kijsa are hosting a Trash to treasure Tuesday. 

I thought it was the perfect time to show off the practice job I did on a smaller piece I already had (for the big china cabinet project.). I always think it's good to do it on an actual piece instead of a practice board, 

 as it gives  a beter visual of curves and lines.

  This is the piece I have that I keep all of those bits and pieces that fit no were else. I love the storage, but it was so heavy and dark looking. Plus, with the kids doing daily laps, it has taken quite a beating, and it's one of those paper board numbers.

After I finshed it, I liked it, but it helped me decide,

 the color I had picked was  way too light and  brown/tan after the glazing.

and I want something a bit more dark cream /beige maybe even a bit of khaki thrown in!.

It was a good practice though!

Jen..unplugged

On Friday, I went a long with Kimba's plan to be unplugged.. I managed to do it for the most part. It was harder than I thought it would be... here is how my day went. 

For entertainment purposes...after each time stamp imagine the music from CSI (duh-nuh-nuh). It will make the post much more interesting. Or if you like, you can imagine the typewriter clicking from 24.

7:30 am. (duh-nuh-nuh) woke up to the 2 year old yelling from the crib "Moooooommmmy! Wake UP! Wake Up! I up! Wake up!" Groggily got the kids breakfast, a cup of coffee (for me) and felt oddly out of place that I couldn't park myself in front of my bloglines for 30 minutes.

9:30 am(duh-nuh-nuh) made the kids beds (What?!) and CLEANED their rooms. I wasn't sure what to do with myself. Picked out paint for the basement. And put the remainder of clothes away. I was  a machine.

10:30 am (you have it now) read books with the kids and enjoyed myself, but secretly wondered how many e-mails I had. Played the Gnu game. I lost on letter K.

11:00 am had to cheat slightly I needed something for  a client, but to my defense I only checked one from my sent e-mail pile and no new ones. Played Rummikub with my oldest. I lost again with 3 tiles to spare. So obviously if you want to feel good about yourself, play a board game with me as anyone over the age of 4 can beat me.

1:00 pm   I had conquered the world. I had restocked my booth, cleaned the kitchen and was started on a new project at which point my husband ambled by. "How come you are getting so much done today....Oooooohhhh yeah, you're "unplugged" today. " He said as he made air  quotation marks with his fingers (Yes, You did.).

3:00pm I sat with a book myself. it was kind of nice, but I did wonder how many e-mails I had gotten.

6pm had to cheat one more time and look up directions on mapquest. I figured cheating was better than getting lost.

After that, I held out till 11 pm at which point I decided I had to know if I had any e-mails and I had to know before I went to bed I mean, it had been all day!

So what do I think? I think I should unplug a little more. For all the right reasons.

(duh-nuh-nuh!)

In shop...

I am in a warm, summer farmer's market mood and of course we had snow this morning!Arrrggh! 

 I made these  bags perfect for carrying all of the fresh fruits and veggies and I have a few extras listed in my Etsy store too! They are a great rectangular size and  I use the one I have for my library books, shopping and the occasional diaper bag too! 

 I have these very trendy Tres Chic bags embellished with a burlap rose. 

And I love these Fat Pig market bags. I can't wait to use mine to get me some of that fresh farmer's markety stuff. MMM... patty pan baby squash...mmm...home-grown nectarines..mmm (okay, I like peaches too but I cannot stand the fuzz.).

Or even  kitchen sign.. 

oh, Spring, where are you?

To paint or not to paint.. that IS the question...

I want to lighten up my decor a bit more and do a more  French meets Sweden in a cottage in the urban country feeling or maybe Anthroplochic.... 

I have this china cabinet I want to paint... it does have some great wood inlay.. but is that any reason not alone not to paint?

Photo from one of my favorite daily reads Reese and Marie 

I would love to do this

This photo is from a fab book, Creating the french look by Annie Sloan

 or this to it...

What do you think?

Jen

A big thank you!

Thanks to everyone who partcipated in the party yesterday! There were some great make overs and fabulous transformations!! I can't wait to see what you come up with next month! As promised also, I am giving a little giveaway to a lucky follower each month! This months' lucky winner is.....

Jax from Living Life  ! Jax send me your e-mail address!

Also, tomorrow I am going unplugged.. all Day.

 Kimba at a Soft Place to Land

is having a get away from the computer intervention...er challenge.... To not be on the computer all day and live a real life. So, I'll be MIA tomorrow, no blogging, no e-mail, nuttin'. This is going to be interesting!  You can do the same if you like! Join in!

Jen

I'll let you know how it went on Saturday!

Welcome to the make-over open house!

Hi and thanks for stopping by! Welcome to the  At Home party!  Join in and show us your fabulous trash to treasures, furniture make-over's, those spray painted items and anything else you've done! The only rules are, you have to link back to this post so that people can visit ( you can grab a code to embed if you like on the right hand sidebar.) and you have to link your specific post so it's easy for party-goers to see! 

My make-over is one of 6 chairs I have been working my way through. 

From old, yucky, gross, but great lines to.... 

New, fresh, clean, distressed. 

Re-upholstered with a vintage grain sack. How cool is that "25" ?

While I was distressing it, my oldest said "Why do you have to make everything look old?"

"Because I like it."

"No way , not me, I like it all shiny and new."

Please tell me I am not raising a modernist; all sleek lines and shiny furniture (shudder, shudder.)! She already rearranges things I "arrange" in the house, I'll find a Polly pocket in my terrarium or littlest pet shop dogs in a tabletop vignette. It's like living with a mini-me, and honestly, one of "me" is more than quite enough for this house. :)

Thanks for joining in! I'll be showing some of the "distressing secrets" I used on this chair next week. Have fun looking at everyone's great stuff!

Jen

Les Fleurs

If I had to pick a love of  a certain kind of art, for me it would certainly be botanical. I really love the old, vintage ones, but I recently priced them and originals can go for as high as $200! I guess it will be reproductions and reprints for me! As an artist, my dream is to spend the day with my colored pencils, sketching the gentle leaves of a Hosta or the bright red roundness of rose hips in the fall. I know I wax romantic when I don't even have the time to wax my legs.... but I thought I would share some of the botanical/floral art from around my home with you.

This was a cheap TJ Maxx score... Love the birds and the leaves.

I found this little toile box in a "junque" shop in Paducah, Kentucky last year for $8.

Yes, this picture was a $2 Salvation Army find. You can hate me now if you like.

I even have  this little candle I thought was stinky, but I loved the glass it was in.

I have  a couple of Kim Parkers' which I adore. The one next to the books was another find  I bought for around $5. That was a good thrifting day.

A girlfriend gave me this one because she hate the gray frame. As you and I know ladies,a little black spray paint will fix anything.

And I just found this one in an old book and thought it looked nice on the sheet music. I am finding reproduction botanical prints for $3 and $4 all over Ebay and am sloooowly adding to my collection here and there. It makes me think of the Spring that is rapidly coming!

Rambling..

I should be in bed,but I am instead blogging, catching up on all of the reading I never get to do during the day, seeing all of the wonderful projects and things every one has done in the last few days while I eat Cadbury's mini-eggs by the handful. Earlier this evening I decided it was finally time to color my hair.  I had been putting it off for  week now.. So, you ask, is my hair natural? This shade of blonde?

Of course it is .. on a three year old... 

But as I learned tonight... don't blog and dye. 

In an effort to take  a hit for the financial team, I've been saving $100 every 4 months and doing a box kit for $10  at home every 4-6 weeks. Since I am sort of blonde( it's called dirty dishwater, if the name of it alone isn't enough to make some one dye their hair.), those kits work fairly well to give me some nice, natural, soft face framing highlights.

Normally. 

Unless you happen to sit down to blog to pass the forty minutes by and suddenly notice it's an hour later and your scalp is.. uh.. burning and you are now not three -year-old blonde, but something else entirely.

So I am like a whole new woman... stripper woman... with my very blonde highlights and  a belly full of chocolate eggs.

It's been quite an evening.

Ready to Party?

The make-over party is coming! This Wednesday! Join in for the fun where you can show off how you made over anything! I'll have Mr. Linky up at midnight on the 24th for any one in a different time zone.

For any one who is unsure how to link up from their blog post; there are two ways to do it..

You can go to my sidebar and copy the code for the button and paste it into the top of the blog spot. That button will link to the blog...

Or,  do it the same way to link to any blog in Blogger:

You can copy my blog/link address. Then highlight the words Sanctuary arts in your blog post. On the tool bar, click on the little round green circle (globe) with the black links and then paste the link into that box. Make sure there is only one http//   . If there are two you have to delete one. When blog addresses don't work, it generally means there are two of those in there.

And join in the fun!

From drab to fab!

I know! I've teased way too long! We had this original builder's dome in our hallway.. very uninspiring and ugly! You know how you want to replace it and then baby number one comes.. and then number 2.. and then well.... So that's it! I finally rescued that thrift store find out of it's dark, dank corner of my spider infested garage. A little paint as you saw in the previous post and...

Tah-dah!

 Some glam for my upstairs hallway! I think it changes the whole look! And I love that I can always put chandelier shades on it if I like to change it up (because you know me..)

Here's the stunt shot for  a better look!

I'd like to thank the academy(my dear hubby) for hanging the chandelier for me and for believing  me that a chandelier would look good even when other's doubted  you can hang a 16 inch chandelier on an 8 foot ceiling. Hey, as long as no one's over 6'4, it's all good.

And I'm hooked on this! To see more things people are hooked on, visit Hooked on houses!

or head over to  Between naps on a porch for metamorphosis monday!

And join in on the make-over party here on the 25th!

Teasing.....

Ceiling medallion

 +

 

$15 thrift store find that has been sitting in my garage for over  a year...    

   

  =

?

The romance of perfectly patina'd plaster... age a new ceiling medallion and make it look old....

Ever wonder how you can take  simple architectural element and turn it into a piece that resembles weathered plaster? It's easier than  you think. Personally, I love the weathered-plaster look, but not the price. I have a lighting project I am working on and I needed a ceiling medallion to cover up a gaping hole that will be left behind from an really cheap, ugly,  gold, Reagan-era bubble light. 1980s.. I know you called...and you can have your light back.

For $6.87 (yes, exactly) we purchased this plastic ceiling medallion, but it needs a little help and age. Like fine wine, somethings do get better with age ;) There are many techniques to age a piece, but this one  is simple and effective.

I coated it first with gesso. What's gesso(jesso)? It's primer for artists so the paint sticks to the canvas surface. The great thing about gesso is that unlike regular silky smooth latex primer, it has a rough texture when painted. I love it for the underlying texture because 200 years ago, they didn't have acrylic primer, but they did have gesso.

After the primer dries, paint  mixture of Burnt Umber and Spice Brown. A little of my primer is not quite dry and is mixed in a bit, but what can I say, I am really impatient.  If you want to add some crackle, you can do that step between the dark coat and top coat (we'll go into crackle another day.).

 After your "dark" coat is dry; rub a candle over all of the raised areas, this will help you later with paint removal (Oops! I almost forgot to take this picture!).

Paint your top coat. 

Let it dry. And dry... and dry.... why is this taking so long?

After it's FINALLY dry,get the surface slightly wet with a damp paper towel, and then  rub lightly all over  with sand paper or a sanding block to remove the top layer. Use just enough pressure to take of a layer to two. If you push too hard, you'll go down to the plastic.

When your sanding is done and you've dusted the piece off, go over it with a brown glaze.

Now...your element is ready to go and you can "love" your new faux plaster piece!

Accidental collections

I didn't start out collecting milk glass, but somehow, bits and pieces  found their way into my house. Looking around, I have  a lot more than I thought. When I need a certain size container to hold something, they just seem to work perfectly. 

This little handled mug holds my drying paint brushes. 

And this is the perfect spot for all of those yucky kitchen sponges.

And right now, this catch-all is holding light bulbs, though someday it's keys and some day's it just overflows with stuff.

In my bathroom this is the perfect place for all of the hair accessories and baubles from a house full of girls.

And this one, though innocent looking,

has screws, nails and a razor blade for all of my furniture repairs.

And this one is a gentle reminder to my kids to eat their 5-9 a day.

Do you have any "accidental" collections hanging around your house?

and you can visit The Charm House for more collections!