Thrift Store Frame to Jewelry Display! {a tutorial}

This tute is a long time coming! I made it during {Headband Week} in August, didn't write it up till September, and now here we are middle of October and I'm finally posting it! Oops. Onto the tute.

A thrifted frame to jewelry holder is one of the most common projects on a craft blog these days. Right up there with rosettes and an elastic waist skirt! Not that that is a bad thing, (I have BOTH on my blog! Well, now all three!) it's kind of fun to reinvent the wheel! Plus, it's one of those things that just WORKS, so why not give it a whirl? Aaaaaand I saw a million cute ones on Pinterest and I just had to try it. Stupid Pinterest.

See? I pinned it {here}

Or this one? {here} Gah, I almost feel silly posting mine!

Care to see it? Too bad, I'm showing you anyway.

I pretty much love it. Up until now, all my jewelry has been crammed in too small jewelry boxes, plastic bags, and strewn all over my room in heaps. Ugh, not cool. I love that everything is organized now and I can actually SEE what my options are! I kept all my fancy stuff in the pretty jewelry boxes, but the everyday stuff I hung up. Care to make your own?

You will need:

• A sturdy wooden frame, it's gotta thick and it's gotta be wood
• Sandpaper
• Scrap fabric
• Hot glue gun
• Nails
• Spray paint
• A handy hubby that is good with tools

This is my frame. I felt so bad for it. Obviously it had been around for years and years and it never even got used. :( No matter, I gave it a good home and now I love it every day. :) I unwrapped it and sanded the crap outta it.

And covered it with several coats of "oil rubbed bronze" spray paint. Ah, already so much better! And shiny....

Seriously, what is it with cats??

Next I wrapped the back of the frame in some pretty fabric and hot glued the edges down. Pull tightly so it's nice and smooth on the front!

I knew I wanted some lace strips at the bottom to hang my dangly earrings, so I glued some down as well. Pull REALLY tightly because the weight of the earrings will make the lace sag. I also glued it down in the middle so it would be a little more stable.

I marked where I wanted all the nails to be with a crayon I found in a drawer. I marked some at the bottom of the frame for really long necklaces, at the top for short necklaces, and on the sides for bracelets.

This is where hubby came in! He very patiently and oh so skillfully nailed nails (redundant much?) into all of those little crayon marks...and there were a lot of them!

"Thanks honey! Oh wait....can you do one more things puh-leeeeeeeeeeeeeaze??"

"Can you install these knobs I got from Anthropologie (on clearance! Three bucks each!) onto this other wood board I spray painted? No...I don't know how to install them. Use those power tools and figure it out kay? Love you!"

I stuck the back back into the frame while the hubs humored my request. No real instructions there.

Then I hung it up and filled it up! That took just as long as the project itself, oi. Oh, did you notice the headband holder?

Thanks for figuring that out hubs! Now I can hand up all my headbands in one place and not have to search the whole house looking for one. (On a side note, I have many more headbands now. This picture is over two months old!)

Ahh, it makes my little nook so much more organized. I've been wearing lots my jewelry now that I can find everything! If you haven't tried one of these yet you really should, they make life so much better. At least 20% better. (Bro hoof!!)

Tradings Posts- Fall wreathes

I know, I'm a bit late on this one! It all happened during my bloggy break. You should read {Caroline's post} because she took wayyy more pictures than I did! Actually...now that I'm rereading her post it will totally put my post to shame, so just save yourself some time and hop on over to see all of it. And I only took pictures of the finished product. Fail Amie.

I blame pertussis. Stupid whooping cough.

Anyway! After a long summer hiatus we finally were able to get together to make some wreathes! I honestly can't remember the last time I made a wreath...I'm not really a wreath person. It might be because I don't have a front door on account of living in a basement but that's beside the point.

This is Caroline's. Isn't it GORGEOUS? She used a fabulous braiding technique and threw that beautiful purple in with her fall colors. I helped her turn a lot of those fabric tubes inside out, so I will hereby claim this wreath to be 20% mine. ;)

This one is mine, a yarn wrapped wreath! This took so. much. yarn. Oh my goodness, Caroline and I were twisting and gluing and twisting and gluing and twisting and gluing until our fingers ached! I do like the result though, its so textural and I love all the colors together!

The best part? It's made out of a $1.50 pipe insulator from Home Depot. Yup! Even though I knew we were making wreathes, I somehow blanked on bringing my wreath form. I remembered the yarn and the felt, but not the wreath! So Caroline took me to Home Depot and we picked up the pipe insulator. Add some duct tape, some batting, and a whole lotta yarn, and BAM! A fall wreath!

Have you made any wreathes lately? Leave me a link!