Branch Coat Hanger

Howdy folks!  It's been too long since I've last posted so here it goes!


The cold weather has brought out some of my favorite things to wear: Scarves, hats, mittens, coats, boots, and anything else that makes you warm and cozy!  However, that also means I need a place to put all of it... Which means it normally ends up strung over a chair or on the ground (becoming Gingi cat's new bed...). This brought on my desire to have a coat hanger so I rummaged through my apartment until I found some things I figured would attribute to my coat hanger needs.  

Here's what I came up with: Scissors, vice grips, coffee (always a necessity for any type of crafting experience), wire (you could also use twine or yarn if you didn't have wire on hand), wire cutters, something to bend the wire around (I chose a baby screwdriver for that), nails, hooks, and sandpaper.

I had spray painted a stick originally for another craft that I did but I got tired of it so it was now the main part for my coat hanger. :)

Here is a step-by-step of what I did:

• I used the scissors to cut off a nice piece of sandpaper to rough up the gold spray paint on the stick. I wanted the stick to have a worn look to it.
• I screwed the hooks into the stick and the vice grips helped me out when it became hard to twist the hooks.
• I drank some coffee.
• I wrapped the wire around the nails and and used the vice grips again to hold the nail in place while I wrapped very tightly (I also used pliers to wrap the wire around even more tight, but they're not in my picture... sorry!).  I left about a foot of wire hanging off of the nail so that I could wrap it around the stick later.
• I drank some coffee and knocked over a cute seal in the process (He premieres in  another post!).
• I tapped on the wall for about 30 minutes trying to find a stud in the wall so that the weight of the coats and scarves wouldn't pull out the nails. I made many wrong attempts and needed spackling paste to cover up the holes in the wall :-/  woops! 
• I used the hammer to put the wire wrapped nails carefully into the wall.
• Then I wrapped the wire around the stick very tightly and wah lah! A coat hanger!

 I probably did a lot of things incorrectly.... But it works!  Let's just not tell my landlord and fiancee about all those extra special holes in the wall :)  

 My giant, thumb-paw cat says Namaste my friends :)

Pumpkin Painting

Holy pumpkin Batman!  It's pumpkin time people!    

I drove by a store with pumpkins and my foot was on the brake immediately!  I bought some tiny pumpkins (adorbs) and two white pumpkins (so classy).  

Since it's a little too early in the season to carve them (I don't want moldy, wilty, pumpkins when Halloween rolls around) I decided I should paint this first round of pumpkins.  I say first round because Lord knows I'll be buying more :/

add some POLKA DOTS

You can never go wrong with polka dots.  So I painted my little orange pumpkins with little white polka dots beside my little spray painted pine cones.

add some PATTERNS & SILHOUETTES 

For the two white pumpkins I chose to paint on a pretty patterns and then add a silhouette on top!   

I thought they looked pretty fun but I wanted more so I asked my fiancee his opinion and he oh-so-nonchalantly said, "Add some dinosaurs."  Of course!  Why didn't I think of that?  He's brilliant.  So for my spiraly pumpkin I wanted to add a few of our favorite dinosaurs.

To help me out....
 

And here is how my spiraly pumpkin turned out! :)

And lastly but not leastly I had to add little Gingi cat onto the polka dotted pumpkin! 

Meowwwwwww ;)

Fall Decoration

Who's ready for the fall!?  This girl is!  Fall is full of Pumpkin Spice lattes, Punkpin Ale, football, flannel, beautiful warm colors that fill the tree's, long walks with leaves crunching under my feet, and so much more!  I went on a little walk through the Tennessee hills and found some pine cones and a lovely, twisted stick that called to me and said, "Take me home with you!"  Here are a few pictures of my walk:

What do you need?

Instructions:

1. Go on a walk :)  and pick up some pine cones and a nice, lovely stick! I decided to peel off the bark on the stick and then use some sandpaper to sand it down so it's nice and smooth.
2. Lay your pine cones and stick out on some newspaper or I used an old towel. Give 'em around 2-3 layers of spray paint.  Let them dry to the touch between coats (It doesn't take long for spray paint to dry!)
3. After the stick and pine cones have dried (I only waited about 30 minutes, because I'm a wee bit impatient!) get out your twine and tie the pines cones to your twine so it's like a garland. Then wrap it around the stick and wah lah! You've got yourself a fall decoration :)

I hung it above our couch :) but I think it would be cute just laying on a mantle!

I'm feeling like our wall is way too barren... I can't figure out what else we should hang on our walls! Any ideas for me?