DIY Chalkboard:

I hope everyone had a blessed Christmas!  

My kid's are snuggled up in bed, the hubby is at the movies, and I'm snuggled up in one of my kid's Snuggies they received for Christmas. ;-) ...all comfy & cozy.

"Yes, I still have my make-up on from today's festivities." ;-)

So this post is ALL about the DIY Chalkboard's I made for "Family" Christmas gifts this year.

I saw this Chalkboard off one of the blogs I follow, YoungHouseLove, and couldn't wait to make one for myself!!!

Of course, after walking up and down Home Depot, and seeing how much the supplies would end up costing me, I needed to come up with my own version.

I needed to make 5 of these, so it would have added up.

I ended up buying Oriented Strand Plywood Board because of the cost, but I would suggest buying a smoother version.  This does work just fine, but it has a bit of a rough surface because of the layering flakes of wood.

I also went with Wood Fencing for the frame instead of 1x6" boards.  By doing so, I saved about 1/2 the price, and it still looks great!

The very first thing I did was paint all of the plywood boards with Chalkboard paint, because that needed drying time in between each coat of paint.  I gave each board 3 coats of paint.

A little funny story about the Chalkboard paint...

I was able to paint 3 boards before running out of paint.  

((This was a can of paint I already had on hand, so it was 1/2 empty to begin with.))

So I called my husband up to ask him if he could bring me home another can of paint.  I didn't even think about having him check to see what color Chalkboard paint it was.

So he comes home with the paint, I open it up, and it's GREEN!!!

The paint I originally had was Black!

It was the night before Christmas Eve, and I was not about to go exchange it out!

So 3 of my boards were painted black, 2 were painted green! =)

While that was all drying, I worked on staining the wood...

I love how it turned out!  Do you see the Peacock feather-like knots in the wood?  Love it!

Okay, here's where things started going wrong...and you know, sometimes that happens with my projects.  In my head, I know exactly what I'm doing, and how it's going to turn out...and in reality, not so much.  ha ha

I bought too short of screws, and when I went to pick up the board, the plywood came right apart from the frame.  My Mom happened to be sitting outside watching me, and so it was actually kind of funny.  But by then, it was now Christmas Eve, and I had NO time to run back out to buy longer screws, and so I had to improvise with what I already had.

I had some Backer-On Board Screws that were just a tad bit too long, so my Dad cut those down for me, and I used those along with some wood glue.

Yes, it may not have been the "correct" screw to use in this situation, but it worked! ha ha

Okay so, I did not know this until my Dad started helping me out...but depending on the kind of wood, in this case, it's best to pre-drill a hole in the wood first before actually drilling in the screw.  I did not do this step the first time, and I ended up cracking the wood.

In the below picture, you can see the wood glue and the screws sitting inside the already pre-drilled holes...

I made 2 different kinds...one with an underlay, where the 2 longer boards are sitting on top of the 2 shorter boards...

...and the other one, where the boards lay flat up against the plywood.

I think they both look great, and it's really a preference.

And here they are!!!

...my 3 year old testing them out.

I attached a bow and chalk to the boards for Christmas gifts!

Merry Christmas to All, and to all a Good Night! =)

~ Jenny xoxo

DIY Jewelry Holder:

I am not much of a jewelry person, but my friend is.  

This would be "her"...see all the pretty jewelry she is wearing?...and I am not?!

A few months ago she kind of mentioned how she needed a jewelry holder to hang all of her necklaces.  From then on I've been browsing Pinterest, trying to decide what kind of holder I wanted to make her.  I went to many Goodwill's thinking I would come across something that would spark an idea, but nothing.

I started thinking about what resources I already had at home, and I tend to incorporate my pallet wood into many of my projects.  I then remembered that I still had a few more pieces of some old fencing that I could use.  
And that's how I came up with this:

Sadly, I do not have any step-by-step pictures, but I think the end result is pretty self explanatory.

The knobs were from Hobby Lobby, and I even bought a letter "K" from there, but my 3 year old got a hold of it, and I'm sure it will never be seen again! ;-)

He actually stuck 2 of the knobs in an ant pile!  Not kidding.

I brushed on some watered down Aqua acrylic paint to the edges.  

Once dry, I sealed it with some mod podge.  This also gave it a smooth, glossy finish.

Since I lost the Hobby Lobby "K", I had to come up with my own.  So I just cut down some scrap pieces of wood, and came up with this:

~ Jenny xoxo

Christmas Card Holder:

There are LOTS of ideas out there to display your Christmas cards and pictures that you receive in the mail this month, and so here's another one...

I have 2 shutters that I bought from a garage sale last year, and they re-locate around my house, because I use them for different things...

Here's the one in my daughter's room:

And I'm using one for Christmas right now!

I picked up some of those wooden letters from Hobby Lobby one day, painted them red.  Took one of my frames and ribbon I already had on hand, and came up with this:

 

I did a dab of hot glue to adhere the letters and frame to the shutter, so that I could easily remove if I wanted to use the shutter for something else. =)

~ Jenny xoxo

DIY Chalkboard Ornaments:

This weekend I needed to make Angel-themed ornaments for a tree-trimming at school.  Originally I was going to stuff some clear ornaments with feathers, but that would have involved me loading up myself and 4 kiddo's JUST to make a trip down to Hobby Lobby for ornaments!  Which is why I started thinking about what I already had lying around the house that I could use.  I remember seeing "Chalkboard Ornaments" on Pinterest, which is when I came up with these...

Okay, here's all I did...

I just cut up a thin piece of wood I already had on hand...

((I was in a hurry, so I didn't worry about making them "perfect"))

3 coats of chalkboard paint later...

Probably the fastest way would be to drill holes into the wood, but I just hammered a nail into them to make a hole.

((I was being lazy, and didn't want to get out my drill! ha ha))

I took some burlap string, and tied feathers to them to go with the angel-theme. =)

I'm also thinking about making a bunch of small chalkboard gift tags!  

Wouldn't that be CUTE?!

~ Jenny xoxo

DIY Chalkboard:

This past week I was busy making Teacher gifts!  I was inspired by Shanty2Chic $5 DIY Chalkboard tutorial, but decided to make them out of shipping pallets instead.  Y'all know how I love my shipping pallets!  ha ha

I already had my pieces of pallet wood cut up, but I needed something smooth for the chalkboard part.  I originally wanted to use a wooden plaque design, but the size I needed were too heavy and thick.  I needed something thin, but solid enough to be able to write on it.
I ended up buying a 1/2 in. piece of Fiberboard from Home Depot, and was able to make 8 smaller boards from it.

Okay, this stuff is actually harder to cut than you would think.  We started off using a box cutter, then moved to a hand saw, and in the end just used an electric hand saw!  ha ha

...and my assembled pieces of pallet wood!

Since I wanted them to have an antique look, I only applied 1 coat of water-based paint...

No need to make sure every piece of wood is completely covered in paint, just kind of quickly brush it on.  You're going to be sanding it down later.

After the paint dries, I applied stain to the edges, creases, or on any imperfections in the wood.  Wipe that off, and you're ready to sand it down!

I used chalkboard paint for the boards, but there is also spray paint available.  

Here's what it looks like after 3 coats of paint...

((FYI:  Chalkboard paint dries FAST!!!))

Screw the chalkboard onto the pallet wood, and...

TADA!

Display it in your kitchen...

For sweet lil' messages...

For the classroom...

For Christmas gifts...

I made these for Teacher gifts this year! 

Hope they like them. =)

~ Jenny xoxo

Interior Wooden Posts:

We have this little open door way going from the living room to the kitchen, and I've always felt like there should be some sort of moulding/trim going around it, just to kind of separate the rooms, maybe?  Instead, it's just plain ol' sheet rock!  Blah!

Okay, so I looked...and looked...and looked through ALL of my pictures, and I couldn't find ONE picture that I had taken of this "walk-way", probably because I would crop it out of my pictures, I hated it so much.  ha ha

I did find THIS picture, very blurry, but this was taken when we were turning the dining room into a guest bedroom...

Here's another one...

So one day while I was re-painting the kitchen, I got this brilliant idea in my head to add wooden beams here.  We're planning on putting these on the outside porch, so why not put them indoors too?  

I already had some leftover wooden posts from the porch, so all it took was cutting them to size, drilling them in, and staining!  

That sounded easy, didn't it?  ha ha

Maybe not so much...I had to get the hubby involved, because #1...I don't like using the electric saw when I don't have to...ha ha  and #2...cutting wood into precise angles sounded too much like MATH...and well, Me and "math" don't get along too well. ;-)

So it went a little something like this...

After measuring and cutting the wood, here he is holding the pieces up for me to make sure that's the look I was going for before actually screwing them in...

Okay so, normally I probably would have stained the wood "before" screwing them into the wall, but I was on a time crunch...so I stained afterwards...

...and after staining:

Here's the porch I want to add the posts to as well...

...and here:

You can see Backyard progress here and here.

I may eventually change it to the moulding/trim I was originally talking about, or I may just keep it as is, depending on how the house revolves. =)

~ Jenny xoxo

Peacock Christmas Tree:

Whohoo!!!  I'd say I'm JUST about done with my Christmas decorating!

I'm sure I could think of more to do, but sometimes I just have to force myself to stop so that I can actually enjoy the Christmas holiday!

Every year we have a tradition of going to pick out our tree the day after Thanksgiving...  

2012

This year I wanted a FUN Christmas tree, and since lately I'm into peacocks, that's what gave me the idea of a peacock-themed Christmas tree!

Here's how it turned out!

Night Time:

You can check out the Stocking Holder here.

Day Time:

Do you recognize these branches?

They actually came from the re-purposed flower arrangement I made for my daughter's room earlier this year.  It took up too much space in her room, and she no longer wanted it in there.  Sigh.  =(  That's okay though, I found a new use for it!  Tee Hee

Something else that I re-purposed were the tulle and felt peacock feathers from her Halloween costume...

...and more pictures of the Tree Topper...

...the two love-bird peacocks = The Hubby & I...awe. =)

...and the 4 feathery little pink birds = our 4 children.  Tee Hee =)

Bows & Burlap!!!

And aren't these cute?...mini chandelier's!

Have you started decorating your Christmas tree yet?

What color scheme do you use?  Do you change your tree up every year?

~ Jenny xoxo