Pallet Flag

I jumped on the bandwagon and made myself a pallet flag. I love the US Flag. I love what it stands for and what it means.

Pallet Flag Supplies:

-pallet
-red, white, and blue paint
-painters tape
-measuring tape
-star stencil
-sander

First, I had Matt dismantle the wood pallet.

I used seven boards and attached them together like so. Make sure the good side of the boards are on the front.

Next, I measured the stripes and star box. I taped each section off like so.

I painted my red stripes first. Once the red paint was dry, I covered the red stripes with tape and painted the remaining stripes white. Once the white paint was dry, I taped around the star box and painted it blue.

After the paint was dry, I made a star stencil with my Cricut and stenciled on the 50 stars.

Finally, after the flag was completely dry, I sanded it down to give it an aged look. To protect it, I sprayed the flag with clear glaze spray.

Here is the flag proudly displayed on my shelf.

God Bless America, Land That I Love...

Garden Boxes

Last year we had our garden in the ground. By the middle of the summer, the weeds took over and the dirt turned into swamp land. At one point while I was weeding, I lost my shoe. It was horrible. This year I told Matt that we were moving the garden area to the other end of the yard and we were going to build boxes.

My neighbor friend and I got serious with this gardening stuff and even took a Square Foot Gardening class through Community Ed. We both learned a lot and decided that that was the way we wanted to set up our garden areas.

Matt and I came up with a layout for our garden area. We decided on (4) 4'x 4'x 12" (2) 4' x 11' x 12" and (1) 4' x 10' x 12" boxes. We went to Home Depot to buy our supplies.

Garden Box Supply List:
-pine Boards
-paint
-Lin Seed Oil
-weed guard fabric
-deck screws

First, Matt cut the boards to the sizes we needed. Next, I spent hours painting the front, sides and ends of each board. I chose to paint my garden boxes Behr's Teal Zeal.

In the gardening class, I learned that if you are going to use wood as your building material for the garden boxes, you need to seal the wood that the dirt is going to touch. The best thing to use that is natural and doesn't have chemicals in it is LinSeed Oil. So, after the paint was dry, we turned the boards over and and rubbed the oil on with a paper towel. Once the oil is applied you have to let the boards sit for about 24 hrs. Just a side note, LinSeed Oil smells yucky. You need to wear gloves if you dont want your hands saturated with this stuff.

Next, attach the boards together using deck screws.

Before we put the boxes outside, in our prepared garden spot, we laid down weed barrier fabric. I hate weeds, so this stuff is a must in my yard.

We rented a dump trailer at South Davis Rental and went to Evergreen Soils in Layton, Ut to get our garden soil mix. We ended up getting six yards of dirt to fill the boxes. We spent around $200. Not bad.

A few days later, I planted my crops. I planted tomatoes, peppers, pumpkins, corn, ghords, herbs, and cucumbers.

Two months ago, this is what our backyard looked like... covered in weeds.

Matt had to weed eat this whole backyard many times.

As it stands today, we have lawn and garden boxes. We even put in some gravel to make a place to park our trailer. Matt is working on cement curbing to divide our garden, trailer parking, and lawn areas. We have big plans for the old garden area. We hope to put in a pergola and fire pit. Hopefully we get to those things this year...

Uncle Sam

The other day while on Pinterest, I came across a pin with an adorable Uncle Sam. I clicked on the picture and it brought me to THIS BLOG/POST. Needless to say, I fell in love even more. So, down to my wood shop I went and made myself a replica of her Uncle Sam.



Supplies:

-8'x12' cut to 4 feet (body)
-2"x2" cut to 16.5 inches (hat brim)
-nose
(2) eyebrows
paint


Once all the pieces were cut, I traced where I wanted the face and beard to be.

After I painted the Uncle Sam, I distressed and stained. Next, I glued his nose, eyebrows, and hat brim onto the body. I let the glue dry overnight.

He turned out so cute. I love when a project turns out just how you pictured it.

Here are my fireworks I made last year. You can find that post HERE.

This is my porch decorated for the 4th of July.

I made these cute stars and hung them on my bannister.




God Bless America!

Birdhouses

This project was plagued with problem after problem. I went one direction, only to change my mind and go another route. There were color problems, roof problems and size problems. I even left the project on the wayside for a week due to frustration. But in the end, I think they turned out cute and better than originally planned!



Birdhouse Tutorial:

The first thing I did was cut the boards to make the birdhouses. I used cedar fence slats (1"x4"x6'). The final sizes I did were 36", 30" and 24". I originally used a wider board for the biggest birdhouse that was 4' tall. This birdhouse caused me the most grief, so in the end I scrapped it and cut out a 30" birdhouse.

I cut the side boards at 36", 30", and 24". The front and back pieces needed to be longer so the roof could be pitched, so I added 5" to the measurements above on the front and back pieces and then cut them to make a triangle.


Next, I used a brad nailer to attach the boards together. I then drilled holes in the front of the birdhouses. I drilled three in the largest one, two in the middle one and one in the smallest. I also drilled a small hole below each hole and put a peg into it. I then sanded each house.


Next, I painted each house.


I didn't like the blue, so I painted it gray. For the roof I glued books on. This is how the project stood for a week. There was something off about them. Like I said, I had color, roof and size problems...


I scrapped big blue and made a 30" birdhouse the same width as the other two. I also shelved the books.


Before you make the same mistake as me, be sure to paint the birdhouse first. There is no picture for this step, but I decided to stain the roof and the pegs. I also glued spanish moss into each hole.












Happy Spring!

Butterfly Prints

Lately, I have been into the vintage botanical print stuff. Last Christmas Matt made me some Christmas Botanical prints of different flowers that represent the Christmas season. This time I had Matt design me some butterfly prints. He used Photoshop to edit the images we found online (THIS SITE has a lot of great vintage botanical/insect prints). Below each image, we added the Latin scientific name of each butterfly.

Once they were perfect, we had Costco print them in a 12"x12" size. We got four prints for $12. I used the same Ikea frames I used for the Christmas prints and hung them on my wall.








What a great addition to my Spring Decor!

Signs of Spring

I am so happy it is spring! The weather is finally warming up, the flowers and trees are blooming and the birds are out. All this also means, It is time to decorate for Spring. Today, I am going to show you my Spring shelf and a tutorial for the flower signs I made.

During winter, I came across THIS cute flower sign. I knew I had to make one (or more) just like it, so I did...




Wood Flower Signs Tutorial:

First, I designed some stencils with my SCAL program and cut them out of vinyl.

Next, out of 3.5"x6' cedar fence slats, I cut three lengths out: 23.5", 18.5" and 12.5".

I then sanded each board.

Next, I painted the boards a cream color.

After the paint dried, I stuck the vinyl stencil on top of the board. I used clear Contact Paper to make sure the stencil went on straight.

Next, I painted the letters on. For all my stamping needs, I use Martha Stewart sponge stampers. The colors I used for the sign lettering are: navy blue for hollyhocks, red for geraniums, and orange for marigolds.

While cutting the boards for the signs, I also cut side slats to frame the signs. This wood is 1"x4' lathe boards. You can buy a bundle of them at Home Depot for $12.

I then painted the side sign slats brown.

After the paint dried on the signs, I distressed each sign by sanding the edges and front of each sign. I also distressed the side slats.

Finally, I nailed the slats onto each side of each sign.

Here is how they turned out...

This is how I decorated my shelf for Spring. I bought the metal vase at the thrift store for $1. I filled the vase with twigs I got from my sister.

I added a bird house and nest I had to the display.

I saw this bee print on a website, so I had Matt Photoshop the image to my liking. I had it developed at Costco for $6. The size is 14.5"x14.5". I put the print in a frame that Matt made me some time ago.
I love how everything came together!


If you are interested in purchasing the vinyl flower name stencils or bee print, send me an email and I will add them to my Etsy Shop.


Happy Spring!!!