From Junk to Treasure

A very old form of creativity is decoupage. You know how you cut pretty pictures out of magazines, books, wallpaper, etc and then glue them on to glass, wood, etc. Last week, I was looking through a magazine and learned that you can also use this art form to beautify simple everyday glass light globes. I've decided to do that to the ceiling globes in the girls' bedroom and the main bathroom. Many of us just use regular everyday white glue such as what school kids use. Just thin it down with a little bit of water. Others prefer to use Mod Podge. Whatever you prefer, you might want to go to the following website and take a look around:

www.favecrafts.com/Decorating-Ideas/Quick-and-Easy-Decoupage-eBook-from-Plaid/ml/1 .

Several years ago, Grandma gave me the old blonde chest of drawers that had belonged to her son, Lee Roy, for years. Though he had used it for many years, it still looked brand new. Blonde furniture is not my cup of tea though so I decided to do something different on it. After it was all done, I could not believe how many people LOVED it!!! Here is what I did:

Since the chest was going to be used in Leighlyn's room (Abigayle was not here yet), I painted the entire thing a very pretty shade of mauve. After everything was nice and dry, I attached the same floral stencil in the same location on all four drawers and on the sides and top of the chest also. I used stencil paint to color all of the flowers white and the leaves a couple of different shades of green. When all of this was dry, it still needed " a little bit more pizzazz." so I took a very small paint brush, dipped it into white stencil paint and just bounced the brush here and there. When that was all dry, I coated everything with several coats of high gloss varnish. To this day, there are no visible scratches. Everything looks just as fresh as it did when I had just finished the project. Decoupage would work just as well!

So go through your storage boxes and find pieces of "junk" and decoupage them with something pretty. Your junk will then be recycled into beautiful works of art!

Have fun! Who knows? This artwork may end up being passed down from generation to generation...

VLE-B