Here’s a closer look at the little art piece I did this week for my St Patrick’s Day mantel.

 I only needed five items for this project.  I had this ”Writer” paint  and some gold paint on hand .  I made the shamrock template. I bought a small canvas ($5.00) and some metallic green paint ($2.00) from Hobby Lobby.

I planned the layout on a scrap piece of paper first.  Then I used a ruler to draw lines on my canvas to keep my writing straight.  I wrote the saying in pencil and traced my shamrock in pencil.  I then spent some time practicing writing with the “Writer” paint on a scrap of paper before I traced the pencil lines on my canvas.  I messed up a couple of times on the canvas, but discovered you can carefully wipe off the bad part and redo it (don’t wait too long because it won’t come off when it’s dry).  When the “Writer” paint was completely dry (I waited overnight) I painted the whole canvass with my metallic green paint.  I had planned to quit there but the writing was a little hard to make out so I highlighted it with some gold paint.

That’s it.  It was a quick (most of the time I spent was waiting for the paint to dry) and easy project. It was cheap too.  The final cost was just under $8.00.   I definitely want to try this again.

Repetition is a design principle where shapes, lines, forms or colors are repeated in a pleasing manner.  Repetition is important because it will bring a sense and order to your room and home.  It will make everything cohesive.  In this room (an Ivory Homes model and 2011 Salt Lake Parade of Homes entry) you may notice that the same colors are repeated throughout the room.  The yellow chairs have teal pillows, the teal chair has a yellow pillow and the cream-colored couch has both. The colors are also repeated in the accessories.   Your eye travels around the room without skipping.  A good rule-of-thumb is to repeat an element, like color or shape, at least three times in a room or throughout your home.

     I was out doing a little Christmas shopping when I got an idea for a Christmas art project.  I hurried home and dug around in the box of Christmas tree ornaments (we didn’t use them all this year).  I found these cute little Santas. 

I also found these shadow boxes I had stored away.

All I had to do is cut some scrapbook paper I had on hand (from this and this).

 I hot glued the ornaments onto the scrapbook paper.

 And voila!  New Christmas art in about five minutes.  And best of all it was free!

      How’s your Christmas decorating coming along?  I think I’m almost done, which is good because decorating the house keeps side tracking me from shopping.  Hope your Christmas season is merry and stress free .

     It all started with me throwing out the sorry rug in my kids’ bathroom.  Let’s just say that it had seen one too many kids with the stomach flu and a bad aim for the toilet.  It was blue, brown and cream.  I was so in love with this color scheme when we moved into this house.  Now, not so much, so tossing it wasn’t too painful.  I was left with a little problem though.  The “Now What” problem.  This bathroom hasn’t a drop of natural light and the blue is seeming a little drab.  I am thinking yellow for the walls. Not a bright yellow but a soft muted yellow. If you’ve been following me for awhile, you know I have been painting the trim in the public areas of the house black.  The door is open most of the time (my kids just don’t comprehend the idea of privacy yet) so you see a good dose of black, but all the trim inside and bath fixtures are white.  I’ve decided to just do all black and white accessories.  That way everything plays nice together and when I’m ready for a change (like maybe yellow, black and white isn’t going to work) I can just change the wall color (I like painting).

     I guess that was a pretty wordy way to get to the point of this post.  The art is free because I had almost everything on hand for this project.  I picked up the frames from Roberts a few years ago.  The paper I framed is from Hobby Lobby.  It was left over from my wall of hooks project (see here).  The only think that I wanted but didn’t have was the bird silhouettes.  There was a quick and simple way around that.  I searched the Internet for “bird silhouette” and found a couple that I liked.  I printed them and cut them out.  I taped them onto the scrapbook paper, put the frames up on the wall and called it a day.  If only everything else was that quick and easy – like picking out the perfect shade of yellow.

     I love these two pictures.  They are from homes in the 2010 Salt Lake Parade of Homes.  I just am really taken with the way the designers gave the houses so much polish and pizzazz with a few really great accessories.  Granted these homes had perfect floor plans and high-end furnishings but it is the accessories that stand out in my mind.