Harvest framed pumpkin hanger

Happy Sunday, y'all! I don't know about you but I like to get stuff done on Sundays! You know, stay productive. I work a full time job Monday through Friday so I have little time left on the weekdays for the stuff I really want to do, like crafting!  Today, I decided to take a shot at the calendar craft. 

A month or so ago I found a ton of the Dollar Tree calendars. They didn't have the one with the trucks and if I had thought about it, I would've bought several of this one. Hindsight is 20/20 right!? I saw some other crafters doing similar things with their calendars and today I made one my own!

I also bought some square signs that were the same size as the calendar pages. I sanded the sparkles off and painted the whole thing black. The reason I did that was because the numbers on the other side were visible through the lighter part of the pumpkin picture. Then I used Mod Podge to glue the photo to the square. There were quite a few wrinkles so I took a paper towel and sort of rubbed the wrinkles out the best I could. 

Some wrinkles were too stubborn so I gave up.  I figured I'd find a way to cover it or draw attention elsewhere. To frame it I used the mini Jenga blocks from Michael's. I mixed up some paint to go with the color scheme in the photo and painted the blocks. 

I had a small issue when I was putting the frame together. In trying to fit 5 blocks across the bottom, it wasn't enough to make it all the was across. But if I used 6 it was too many. So I improvised. I had some square wood pieces that solved that issue. The only problem was that it was not the same thickness as the Jenga blocks and it stuck out more. 

I racked my brain trying to come up with a way to either hide that one block or at least disguise it. I decided to add a few more embellishments and just make it work! I glued a few pieces of twine on it to look kind of like part of a fence or something. Then I cut out a cute little truck from a piece of fabric and glued it to a burlap leaf. I also added a little sprig of white flowers. I used a few sprigs in the bow to tie it all together. 

The bow was fun to assemble! I went through my ribbon and chose a few that matched the color scheme, some burlap, a blue and white one and a thin brown one for accent. 

Before I adhered the ribbon I attached some twine for hanging. I used the holes that were already in the square. I had removed the twine that came with it because I felt it was too short. I tripled the strands for stability. The blocks made it a little heavier than I thought they would and I didn't want it falling apart! I also wrapped a little piece of twine around the center of the bow and attached it to a piece of twine on the back that was part of the twine I used to hang it. More stability!! Then I hot glued the bow in place. 

The final touch was to put a few splashes of the paint I mixed for the blocks on the pumpkin in the photo to pull it all together. I probably didn't need to do that but i wanted to.  And lastly, the little metal 'harvest's sign. I glued that on with hot glue. I played with the placement for a few and thought it looked best at an angle. 

Thank you so much for stopping by and reading my harvest framed pumpkin hanger post!! I hope you like how it turned out! Please let me know if you try this or something similar. The Dollar Tree calendars are so cute! 

Hop on over to my Facebook Craft Group page to see some of the crafts I've done live. This particular one I did not do live but there are several others and they're super cute! Be sure to like and share and invite your crafty friends and family to share in the fun too! I really appreciate the love and support and as always, I can't wait for the next crafty adventure!!!

Pumpkin wire form hanger

 That title is a mouth full, eh? Ha ha ha! Seriously, this was another super fun craft!! I had so many ideas that I had to post a poll on my Facebook Craft Group page so my crafty followers could help me decide!  One idea I had was to put two wire forms together to form one big pumpkin and create some type of stand to display it on my kitchen table.  I may still do that because I have more forms.  But for this craft I decided to make it a hanger.  Maybe down the road I'll create some type of stand for it using the mini Jenga blocks!  Stay tuned for that!! 

My inspiration for this one came from a couple different places.  One of the crafters I watch had posted a craft with the metal pumpkin wire forms and then I saw it popping up in some groups I follow on Facebook.  I decided to give it a whirl and of course, make it my own.  I had a super hard time finding the wire forms so a couple awesome friends picked some up for me.  Super awesome girls!! Love them!! I ran to Hobby Lobby and picked up a few more embellishments and even stopped at Dollar Tree again and picked up some small pumpkins, which I didn't end up using. Oh well. I'll find a way to use them, promise! 

Here are some of the supplies I used:

I wanted to cover the wire in jute knowing it would be a lengthy and daunting process.  It took about an hour.  That's not as bad as I had anticipated!! I wound the jute around each piece of wire, hot gluing as I went to reinforce and make sure that if a piece of jute came loose, the whole thing wouldn't just fall apart!  

Much like the splatter screen pumpkin, I wanted to add flowers and leaves to the bottom.  I arranged them on the table in front of me to try to get an idea of where I wanted to place them. I didn't want to just start gluing them on all willy-nilly.  He he! Here's the thing.  I don't want anything I create to fall apart.  I LOVE glue.  But often times it's extremely hard to remove without damaging the craft.  I only had so many leaves to work with and jute isn't always forgiving either!  One by one I got the leaves where I wanted them, sneaking in a couple of the buffalo check leaves and the burlap leaves.  I was so excited to use those!! The leaves were very vibrant and good quality. I got those at Hobby Lobby for $2.50 a twig.  I know that's not the proper name for it, but it wasn't a bag, ok? They were better than the ones in the bag.  Kind of a velvet texture, almost.  I had a little wooden pumpkin that I wanted to incorporate so I covered it with fabric that I also found at Hobby Lobby, on clearance!  I managed to get the words almost perfectly displayed when I glued it down, much to my amazement! I added little green floral wire vines around the stem too! I even covered the little stem with twine, to match the stem on the bigger pumpkin. It's the little things, folks.

The bow was a little bit of a challenge.  I've never made a decent bow in my life!  However, I watched several people online using a bow maker so I decided to make my own!  I bought one of those long, rectangular decorative box frames from Dollar Tree (see the one pictured above in the supplies photo that says 'Harvest Blessings').  I painted over the stock photo with white chalk paint, drilled a couple holes and then painted to fit my fancy.  I glued wooden dowels in the holes and added a green pipe cleaner.  Don't ask.  I mean, it's kind of there to cover up all the hot glue I had to use to keep the dowels in place. Don't judge me. I'm not one to use a ruler or measuring tape often so it's not perfect.  But I did add lines for guidance so I'm not a complete flake. 

I  decided to use some decco mesh on the back of the bow which wasn't entirely a good idea, but I made it work! In hindsight I should've used a little more of the larger decorative ribbon instead. All in all it turned out cute, I think. And that bow maker...worked like a charm! I know it's not as fancy and functional as the one you can buy but it worked for me!! 

I found some little sunflowers I bought a while back and decided to add a few to the frame.  They just twisted on so I knew I could take them right back off if I didn't like them. It works!! So I left them. 

Another fun, super cute craft in the books.  Thank you to everyone who voted in the poll to help me decide which one to make.  Here is the sketch I drew of the different ideas I had.  Again, I may still make the table top one but I'll have to experiment a little with that too.  So I probably won't do that one live.  Unleeeeesssss I give it a Halloween vibe!!! Ooooohhh! Now there's an idea!! 

Next craft will probably be the witch hat.  You'll have to jump over to my Facebook Craft Group page for more details!! I found out about something super cool that we can do with that witch hat that is not Halloween related at all!! So excited!

Thank you once again for stopping by my blog and being a part of my crafty adventures!  I can't wait to get started on the next one!! 

Happy crafting!!

Splatter Screen Pumpkin

 

Splatter Screen Pumpkin magic! That's what I say.  This is another craft that I saw on Pinterest and in some of the craft groups I follow.  I had to try it.  Dollar Tree splatter screens, leaves, metal 'welcome' sign, jute, flowers and a whole lotta fun! I'm in!! 

This was so easy and so stinkin' cute!! I bought 3 splatter screens and used Rustoleum rustic orange indoor/outdoor paint to coat the frame and the screen.

Once those dried, which didn't take long at all.  I initially hot glued a few spots to hold the screens together to form a pumpkin but as I started working with it, that glue didn't hold very well.  So, I wrapped the handles with jute, hot gluing it as I went.  I later put a few dabs of hot glue on the screens once again, just for stability.  I saw in other posts and pictures how some people took the two outside screen handles, flipped them so they were at the bottom and bent them backward to create a 'stand' so the piece could be displayed upright on a table or shelf.  Super cute! But I didn't see that until AFTER I made this.  Ha! Either way, I wanted to hang it on my front door so it worked out. 

For the center part, when I lined it, I just glued the glue right on top of the screen to make it look like it was lining the frame of the overlapping layers under it.  That worked out perfectly. Now it was time to place some leaves and flowers!  I loved the lighter colored flowers with the burlap petals on the inside! So cute and such a great accent!

Once I placed the flowers I decided to create a few little spiral vines coming off the stem of the pumpkin. You know those little green twirly thingys? What do you even call them? I had some green wire and decided to wind it around a pencil to create the spirals. Then I fed them into the twine, and twisted to secure them. 

Because I wanted this to hang on my door I knew I'd have to find a creative way to incorporate a 'hanger'.  So let me back up just a little.  Before I wrapped the stem of the pumpkin with jute, I created a loop to hang it from.  I wrapped the bottom of it around the base of the stem and then kept it centered while I continued to wrap the whole stem with another piece of jute.  The idea was to keep the piece for hanging secured in place for more stability.  I didn't want the pumpkin to teeter back and forth if the hanger wasn't secure.  Make sense? I added some green leaves around the base of the stem as well. 

I couldn't decide easily where I wanted to place the 'welcome' sign.  It's a little metal sign.  I also couldn't decide if I wanted to leave it raw metal or paint it. I decided to leave it raw.  I really liked doing this one and I hope you all like it too! It was simple, not too busy (like I usually tend to be with my crafts) and the perfect size for my front door! 

If you enjoyed this blog post, please check out some of my other posts with other cute, easy, inexpensive crafts that I've done.  My next blog will be another hanging pumpkin craft that I made using the Dollar Tree pumpkin wire wreath frame.  A little busier than this one but so, so cute!! 

Please share with your friends and family and be sure to check out my Facebook Craft Page for live videos and more!! Thank you so much for stopping by my blog today and supporting me in my crafty adventures!! 

Happy Crafting, y'all!!