Trash to Treasure Tuesday

I'm a bit behind but I'm coming up with lots of excuses, I'll spare you the details and just amaze you with a pretty fun trash to treasure Tuesday.  

The Saturday after Thanksgiving has been a family shopping day for many years.  The sisters and I make a trip to Eau Claire and many years ago we brought our girls.  They got sore feet, they wanted everything, they pouted, the laughed, we took them to movies, we had great family time.  Then...... they grew up and us sisters had to continue to shop that day by ourselves.  

Now we have my girls back again and their girls.  The little girls get sore feet, they pout, they want everything, they love to spend their money and we do lots of fun stuff with them.  

This year we went to Goodwill on a Ugly Sweater Hunt for Gayle.  She ended up with 3 of them.... all perfect so it was hard to decide.  Then I got sucked into the "junk" and my arms filled up.  I was on the hunt for churches..... ugly cheap churches.  And after filling everyone's arms with churches and reindeer.... a few hours later we exit the store.  

Pretty ugly church.... since Lynn was holding this one we called it the Baptist church.  I was pushing my churchs on everyone.

The Catholic church..... in our small towns we have lots of taverns and churches.

The trio tiny village with a church that isn't pictured.

Baptist church painted white - yep bet you guessed that already :)  I'm loving my white

A little distressing.....

A bit of glitter.....

And we have pretty churches.....

Lynn got her Baptist church today and I'm keeping the Catholic church.  They are beautiful.  Now why didn't I buy all those village houses I seen a few weeks ago for a song and have an entire white village?   DANG!!

I've heard many stories from my sisters about a white nylon net tree that my mom had.  It was something you had to assemble every Christmas and the older sisters got that task.  I was probably in their way and stealing pieces they needed.  After so many years of this tree being in the daylight and being assembled it rotted and became un-useable.  My sisters were sad, I didn't know any different.  They researched a few years ago and found a pattern to make them.  I'm still not interested.....  

This summer we had a reunion and my sister Sharon had nylon net trees to action off.  John has no idea that I know nothing about them, I'm not sitting next to him and he hears family memories of the tree and he bids until he buys me one.  So sweet

BUT I know nothing about this tree...... after 2 hours swearing like a sailor, reading directions (if you know me, you know I don't read directions) requesting a drink, calling my sister to vent, throw the whole thing across the living room..... it's up.

It's amazing.....it really wasn't that bad.  Now I have a tree that fits my white village and a memory of my mom.  I find myself staring at it and knowing why my mom loved hers, it's beautiful.

Surround yourself with family memories and if you don't have many, make some.  

Later.....

Winter decor in the sunshine

Sunday was so nice it was hard to spend anytime indoors.... so I didn't.  

Normally I'm not a Christmas decorator, I've had lights outside but nothing special and haven't ever decorated with live greenery.  But Sunday was so nice I decided to decorate my pots on the porch (and then I didn't have to empty them and put them away for the winter).  So this is the finished product.  Pots are looking a little dull....

So of course I painted them with chalk paint.  Why not paint after the pots are totally done :)

I never did take a picture of them after they were painted.  There are 3 on the porch and then I dug another one out of the garden shed and put it by the main door on the house.  

Hung lights on the deck and decorated my old bike.

Then I cleaned out a few flower beds and burnt all the dried flowers.  I made quite the smoky neighborhood.  Actually got a text from the neighbors that they were smoked out.

Do you have flower pots that are tired and dull looking?   Paint them.    Later.....

Trash to Treasure Tuesday

The second hand store is starting to put out their Christmas decorations and there are a TON of them.  I'm not normally a seasonal decorator but a few things catch my eye.  These stoneware plates did.  The snowflakes are so big and they are puffy giving them a 3 dimensional look.  

Each one under 50 cents I decided they were worth a shot at making pretty.

If you liked them before you might want to stop reading.  I didn't like the brown color.  

I painted them all white.

Then I painted one a soft blue,one a soft pink and kept one white.

Gave them a bit of distressing bring out the dimensional look and help the white and brown peek out from under the color.

Now here's a helpful tip.  Using E6000 glue, attach a soda can tab to the back of the plate.  Let them dry overnight.

 So having to take a photo of them was the most difficult part.  I found a wide worn out board in the garage that was perfect for the display.  Gave it a quick sanding to smooth our the rough spots and a oil rub to bring out the color and then I attached three nails and hung the plates on it from their soda can tabs.  

The Christmas holiday is a ways away yet, heck I just got my fall decor up so this little location was easy to swap out for a bit of a wintery look and then swap back to fall.  

Yep I have a dresser in my house that is not painted.....and missing a knob.... why you ask?  Because I'm always too busy painting for everyone else that I never get my own done.  Kinda like a mechanic who's car is past due for an oil change or a carpenter who's house has no trim..... same thing.

I gave each of the plates some dark wax for a dirty vintage look, here you can see the details.

That red wall has got to go..... maybe this weekend I'll get time to paint it.

What treasure can you find in the trash...... later