DIY – How to make pots look like expensive stone planters!

Every time I walked through the Garden section of Bunnings, I would dream about concrete/stone planters instead of the giant ugly plastic pots in my alfresco. That is when I thought of giving them a makeover.. What if I could give my existing sad plastic pots a new life as funky fake stone planters?

The pots were old and scuffed, but as they were in sound shape I thought it was a great idea to give them a new life versus buying new and expensive pots.




I remembered I had some Dulux Design Stone Paint lying around from our house painting back in February. So, thought it would be just right for the makeover. Do not have the Design stone paint? Fret not. I have jotted down steps that you can use to recreate the look with items that are readily available.

So, here is how I refreshed the pots.

Supplies needed:

• A plastic pot to upcycle
• Sanding block/ Sandpaper
• Dust Mask for protection 
• Paint brush
• Container for mixing paint
• Disposable rubber gloves to protect hands
• Drop Sheet/Newspaper for protecting the floor
• Dulux Design Stone Paint
  OR
  Grey paint (or you can mix White and Black paint) - You could use regular wall paint.
  If using regular paint, you will need the following additional items to recreate the effect:
• Plastic bag for shading 
• Plaster of Paris

Directions:

1. Place the drop sheet on the floor, and start with sanding the pot with a sanding block or sandpaper. Wear a dust mask to minimize intake.
   
   
2. Wipe dust away thoroughly with a piece of cloth.
3. Take the paint out in a disposable container. If mixing colors to make paint, then do that here.
4. I straight away used the Dulux Design Stone Paint on the pot using a criss-cross pattern to get the realistic look.
   
   
   
   If using regular paint,  give the pot one coat of Grey paint. Work in criss-cross motion to get some texture. Don’t forget to do the internal ring of the pot too.
5. For the stone look, mix Plaster of Paris powder in one batch of paint and slap on the pot. Make sure you work with batches. Get details on this procedure in my DIY Copper Patina wall tutorial.
6. Use a plastic bag to scrunch out a lighter shade of grey to get patches like concrete. 

Large real stone/concrete planters retail for more than $150, so I’m thrilled that these ‘stone painted’ pots look close enough to the real thing! Just look at the transformation:

Love,
Divya

DIY Decorative Diwali Candle/Tealight/Diya Floor Stand with supplies at home!

Diwali is just around the corner, and I wanted to make some new fun stuff for decorations around the home. It is our first Diwali, in our first home! This one has to be special, but I wanted to make something versatile, rather than one that would be tucked away for the rest of the year. That's when I came up with the idea of this Floor Diya Stand. It is quick and gorgeous, and will also liven any decor! Once Diwali is gone, it can be used as a cupcake stand for parties!!

Also, this project took me a total of 1 hour 15 minutes, and the end result is SO worth it!

Supplies needed:

• Recycled Cardboard sheets - I used empty carton boxes which I had lying around from when we were painting. 

• Thick Cardboard rolls - You could use toilet paper rolls, paper towel rolls, or even wrapping paper rolls
• Decorative paper - You could use scrapbook paper, origami paper, recycled cardboard sheets, whatever you have at hand
• Laces 
• Glue
• Glue Gun
• Pencil
• Ruler
• Tea lights for decoration
• Rhinestones, or any other items for decoration

Directions:

You can go with any other shape - triangle, circle or a flower for the "levels", but I thought squares would be quickest to make, and I was right. If you have time, you could tweak this tutorial to make any other shape. 

Also, I wanted height, so I made four "levels", you can add or remove to suit your space and liking.

1. I started with cutting out pieces of cardboard. These would make the base and the "levels".
I used the following measurements:

- 10 cm x 10 cm
- 15 cm x 15 cm
- 20 cm x 20 cm
- 25 cm x 25 cm  

Here are the final cardboard pieces. (You can see the paint splatters on most of them!)

2. Then, I started wrapping the cardboard in paper on both the sides. 

 

Then covering it with glitter paper and some fun scrapbook paper. Now, you could go crazy with colors because Diwali is all about colors, but since I wanted to reuse this as a cupcake stand in the near future, I kept it subtle.

 

Here are the final cardboard pieces:

 

3. Now, I should have measure the height and all, but I just ended up using one toilet paper roll as it is, and splitting the paper towel roll exactly in half for the three pillars creating the height.

4. I had Glitter cloth lying around, so I used it to wrap the rolls. You could use some decorative paper fabric, lace, or glitter tape to cover it up.

 

5. Now the glitter shebang starts! Use the glue gun to add whatever decorative laces or tape you want to the sides of the cardboard pieces.

6.  Assemble with the help of glue gun! 

 

 7. Stick on flowers, rhinestones or pearls

And we are done.. TA-DA!

8. Decorate with tealights/diyas/candles or cupcakes! :)

Let me know if you try this. And I would love to see pics of your handmade Diwali decorations, so please do share!

Xoxo

Divya

DIY Color Swatch Art

The wall in front of my table in the craft room had been blank and drab forever. My initial plan was to add a pegboard but husband had a fit at the number of holes we would be making in the wall in the process. Check out the rest of my Craft Room/Study here.

While watching the Fixer Upper series, I noticed some Color Swatch Art in one of the styled houses and literally fell in love with the idea. I knew that this would be the perfect pop of inspiration I needed on my wall, also adding color to the space.


The same day, we were off to Spotlight to get some canvases for the purpose. I grabbed 8 of the 11"x14" ones for 2$ each. (SCORE!) Just look at the transformation!

Supplies needed: 

• 11"x14" canvas - 8
  (Technically, the number and the size of the canvas would depend on the size of the wall you would like to cover with this project)
• Acrylic Paint
  (In the colors you would like to paint, or you could mix up colors to make new ones, totally up to you!)
• Alphabet Stencils 
• Mod Podge
• Pencil
• Ruler 
• Eraser

Directions:

1. I started with creating an outline for the color swatch with a pencil and a ruler. I wanted a 1 cm border around three sides, just because I think that looked better. My measurements of the square hence, turned out to be 25.5cm x 25.5cm. I created these on all the canvases as a guide for the paint.
    
   
2. Then I decided on the color palette I wanted to paint, and started to fill in the squares with the decided colors. I decided on the following shades: Crimson Red, Cadmium Yellow, Cobalt Blue, and made some pastel and neutral shades: Jade Green, Lilac Purple, Light Pink, Steel Grey and a Bright Orange. The painting need not be perfect, so I slapped the paint on!
   
   
   
   
   
3. Once this was complete, I stenciled out the color names on the bottom of each swatch canvas with pencil. I could have spelled out the exact color, but I only wanted to replicate the look and feel of a swatch, so kept it super simple!
   
   
   
4. With black paint I filled in these words. This was the most time consuming and tiring part of the entire project since this needed to be precise. You could use other mediums to do this, but I wanted to paint.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
5. Once everything was dried up, I mod podged all the canvases to seal and finish them up. This gave them a professional look and removed any major inconsistencies in paint color.
   
   
   

   

Two more to finish, and that's it, all done and ready to hang... love them to pieces! We used 3M Picture strips to hang these canvases. Trying to figure out the arrangement here:

And this is what the final arrangement looks like! They add such a fun vibe to the room and lots of pops of colors - perfect accompaniment to my doodle wall!

Hope these have inspired you to make something fun and colorful for your home! 

Xoxo

Divya

DIY Industrial Laundry Sign

I hate laundry. Anyone else with me on that?

It’s that task that I always put off to do. And don’t even get me started on the pains of ironing.

Our laundry room has been empty since we came into our home. A brand new washing machine and dryer did fill the floor space, but the walls have been empty ever since. We would like to add some storage cabinets on the walls, but that’s one of those snowball projects that is pushed to "some day".

So, I decided to add some decorative stuff on the adjacent walls at least, and what better way than to create a hand painted, industrial LAUNDRY sign. (Just in case no one knew what was going on in this little area.)

Here’s what you need to make a vintage rustic Industrial LAUNDRY sign. Or you could use the idea to make something similar for any room!

Materials:

• A piece of wood - I used some recycled wood I had lying around the garden of our home.We used a hand saw to cut the piece to the size we wanted.
• Sandpaper/ Sanding block
• Computer print out and a pencil
• Wax crayons
• Clear timber wax polish 
• Metal bits: 

1. Kinetic 15 x 150mm Galvanised Pipe
2. Kinetic 15mm Galvanised Flange
3. Kinetic 15mm Female Galvanised Tee

Instructions:

1. First we cut the piece of wood with a saw and sanded the entire piece of recycled wood along with the edges. I used a cloth to wipe away the fine dust.
   
   
   
   

   

   
   
2. After the wood was sanded, I printed out the word LAUNDRY on my computer to the size I needed. I used a regular font as I only wanted an outline to give me some idea of the size and placement.
   
   
3. I used a waxed crayon to color the back of the printout, placed it on wood, and then with a pencil, I traced the outline of each letter onto the wood where I wanted it to go, but the correct way. This rubbing effect transfers the pencil outline via the wax crayon from the back of the printout onto the piece of wood.
   
   
   

   

   
   
4. After transfer, I painted them in with black acrylic paint. I didn’t fill in the letters perfectly going for the vintage look.
   
   
   
   
5. I took some sandpaper and sanded off the paint in some spots as well. You can see I smudged the letter "R" a little bit, but that seemed to vanish after sanding and waxing.
6. Then I finally finished it off with a good wax to seal it up and add some sheen and finish.
   
   
    
   
   The clear wax works like magic! Look at that gorgeous wood grain and color coming through!
   
   
   
   

   

   
   
7. Next step is optional, but hubs helped me attach the fun metal bits to the wall to give it the industrial look. (Now it goes with the industrial pipe lights in the dining room, and the pipe fittings on our entertainment unit!) A trip to Bunnings got us all the tidbits we needed. It is so much fun when we share the madness of home decorating!

Here’s my fun industrial LAUNDRY sign hanging on the wall. I think I'm addicted and will make lots more!

I love how it looks! What do you think?

Recycled Coffee Bean Sack Cushion - DIY

I purchased some coffee bean sacks from a warehouse in the middle of nowhere awhile ago. I had made some table runners for my craft stall using a few, and still had some sitting in my garage just waiting to be transformed.

Ever since my folks got us a (mind blowing!) Breville Coffee machine, I wanted to transform our formal living room to make it an informal fun place to hang out! My transformed pallet wood IKEA tables already added so much character to the place, but I knew I wanted to make some recycled coffee bean sack cushions to add to the couch (in the process also transforming some existing sad-looking cushions I had bought ages ago). Here is how they turned out.

These recycled burlap coffee bean sack cushions require only one coffee bean bag, simple stitching (but thank God mum and dad helped!) and can be made in no time!

DIY Pantry Door Upgrade!

Our open plan living-dining-kitchen area works great for all purposes, but I wanted to add some fun to this boring kitchen pantry wall. We have two big pantry cupboards which I love, but all seemed too white in this area of the home with no texture or interest.



I, of course Googled and Pinterested (is that even a word?) around to get a lot of ideas, and the most inspirational for me was this blog from Sherri. I wanted to convert my pantry flat doors into a paneled door with trim and a chalkboard.

I'm sure you've seen lots and lots of blog posts of completely transformed doors, and I am going to share with you one simple transformation that is so easy and fab to do, and the best part is you can use this method to dress up whichever room door you like.

Supplies:

• Decorative trim (We got this one from Bunnings)
• Tape measure
• Tooth saw
• Pencil 
• Clear timber varnish
• Miter box (for cutting at 45 degree angles)
• Liquid nails/Wood glue
• Door Primer (We used some wall primer we had lying around the house from when we painted the walls)
• Paints:
      - Acrylic paint (if you want to paint your trims)
      - Chalkboard paint
• Sanding block/Sand paper/ Sanding machine
• Spirit level