DIY Hand-Painted Furniture

I painted this vintage metal stool a few years ago. I have always loved the French term, "Joie De Vivre" which means "Joy of Life" or "Joy of Living", and I thought this would be a fun reminder (and it looks so much more elegant in French!!) If you have a favorite word or expression that you would like to paint on a piece of furniture, here are the detailed DIY instructions:

Materials

• Furniture to be painted
• Computer
• Printer
• Carbon paper
• Painter's tape or other removable tape
• Dull pencil
• Acrylic craft paint
• Tiny paintbrush
• Water-based polyurethane (optional)

Instructions

1. Type your word or phrase into your computer using a word processing program such as Microsoft Word.

2. Highlight your text and select a font that you like. For the stool above, I used a font called "French Script" (Oh how ironic! I promise, the name is just a coincidence!)

3. Change the font to your desired size. This may take some experimentation. If the drop down menu in your word processing program only lists font sizes up to 72, you can highlight your text, and then highlight the font numbers at the top of the drop down menu and manually type in a larger number (eg: 100) and the font size will change.

4. Print out your text. You don't need to use the best quality print setting, as long as the text is clearly legible.

5. Trim your text paper to a size that is manageable in relation to your piece of furniture (a smaller paper size will be easier to center on your furniture), then trim a piece of your carbon paper to the same size.

6. Layer your printed text and your carbon paper (with the carbon facing the furniture surface to be painted) and tape them both to the furniture where you would like to paint your words (you will have a "carbon sandwich" with the printed text and your furniture acting as the "bread").

7. Use your dull pencil to carefully trace just inside the edge of each of the letters. Depending on what you are painting, you may want to lay your furniture on its back so that you can trace more easily. Be sure to press hard.

8. Remove your text paper & the carbon paper.

9. Use your tiny paintbrush to paint inside the traced outlines of the letters. It's just like coloring in a coloring book--just start with the edges and then fill in the middle. If you make a mistake, you can either turn it into a fonty-looking flourish (see close up photo) or use a damp rag to erase it. (Note: my text appears to have a weird curve in the photo because my furniture surface was concave.)










10. Allow paint to dry. If your furniture will only get light use, you're finished (acrylics are water-based, but once they're dry, they're tough to remove...as evidenced by the many paint stains on my clothes). If you need your furniture to be washable (eg: a dining chair that might get spaghetti sauce splattered on it), you can paint a layer of a clear polyurethane over the text to seal it in. I like Polycrylic because it doesn't yellow the way an oil-based poly will.

Voila! Enjoy your new hand-painted piece!

Clever Storage Alert: Stair Drawers!

I spotted these stair drawers on page 127 of the January issue of Good Housekeeping--what an inventive idea! If you're looking for a tidy solution for corralling shoes (or gloves, or sunglasses, or dog leashes) near the front door, this may just be it. A few caveats: first, this is not a DIY project; plan to consult a carpenter for help with this one. Also, it seems to me that you'd want to find a way to spring load the drawers to close automatically so that you don't find yourself stepping into an open drawer one night and cartwheeling, cartoon-style, down the stairs!



Photo border credit: Stockxchng

Tree Stump Tables

As you may have gathered from my other blog posts, I'm a big fan of furnishings and accessories that can work equally well in traditional and contemporary homes. Tables made from tree stumps fall nicely into this category, in my opinion. In a cottage they're cozy, and in an urban loft they're eclectic. I've spotted enough of these now that I had to blog about them. If you're "stumped" about where to find one, read on.

The tables on the top left are from Pottery Barn and are priced at $199-$299. West Elm (Pottery Barn's cheaper, more contemporary cousin) also offers a natural tree stump side table for $199 (photo top right). Page 38 of the March 2008 Issue of Domino Magazine featured a pricier tree stump stool from ABC Carpet and Home ($1,695, pictured bottom left). (Ah yes, that one must have been made from the stump of the fabled money tree!)

If you're a do-it-yourselfer and you want to "branch" out and make your own tree stump table like the ones in the lower right photo, Martha Stewart offers DIY instructions here.

Three Unconventional Floor Coverings

Sure, gleaming hardwood floors are gorgeous and tile is timeless, but I can't help but appreciate the creativity of these unconventional floor coverings:




















Wine Crates
A Domino Magazine reader sent this photo for inclusion in the "Cheap Tricks" section of the Domino website. What a clever way to repurpose wine crates! I'm a little puzzled by the fact that this is a bathroom floor though--this idea seems more appropriate for a kitchen or a casual dining space to me.















Brown Paper Bags
Kathy Wilson, whose official title is "The Budget Decorator" offers this tutorial on how to create a rustic faux leather floor using torn brown paper bags. She adds that repairing damage to the floor just involves ripping up a new bag!















Recycled Leather Belt Floor Tiles
At $75 /sq.foot, these modular floor tiles from Ting are pricey, but what a neat idea!

Great Money-Saving Tips From This Old House

Looking for ways to save a little moolah on home-related expenses? Check out "50 Nifty Tricks for Big DIY Savings" from This Old House. My favorite was tip #3: keep closet doors closed. Now that's my kind of easy DIY project! Not only will you save $50 per year on energy expenses, but you'll be improving your home's Feng Shui!

Photo Credit: Amy Bell

Calendars as Art-- Cavallini & Co.

This is a good time of year to start sleuthing out 2009 calendar sales. Buying a wall calendar is a great way to purchase a series of frame-worthy prints at a terrific price. The key is to find a calendar that doesn't look like a calendar.

Cavallini & Co. calendars are printed in Italy on heavy ivory laid paper, and they are gorgeous! The large wall calendars are rectangular, rather than square, giving the images a very un-calendar-like "framability". They also offer small desk calendars, which would yield little prints to frame in a series. The vintage nature images are well-suited to a more traditional home, while the vintage travel and city images would be at home in transitional or contemporary settings.

Feast your eyes on their entire 2009 collection here . Photos above are from Calendars.com.

Looking for another use for vintage calendar pages? Here's a lampshade that I covered with a few pages from an old Cavallini calendar.

A "Picnik" in the Dead of Winter!

Picnik is a fabulous, free online photo editing site. It's unique in that there is no need to download a program to your computer (or even sign up for an account for that matter). Users can upload their own images to the Picnik site, edit images directly on the site, and save the newly edited images to their personal computers. The editing tools are a snap to use, and the creative possibilities are virtually limitless! Transform your digital photos into a striking gallery of black and white or sepia images to display in your home, or go beyond the basics to create original works of art by layering text and shapes with fun special effects. I edited my image above using Picnik. Caution: photo editing can be addictive!

Print , Pattern, Paper

I recently stumbled upon Print Pattern Paper, the website of Wisconsin-based artist Rebecca Peragine. Reproductions of her cheerful collages are available for purchase in a number of forms ranging from note card sets to gallery wrapped canvases. These would be so fun in a child's room!