Painting Gourds

Well, another fail in that I forgot to take pictures in the making of these little fellows!

I did take this one which shows I first spray painted them in white, then went over them in red.  I obviously painted the faces on the white part, using a flesh tinted paint color for the face.  Everything else is pretty much self explanatory, except for the hair.  If you do decide to paint Santa's or anything else with hair, a must have is a "rake brush".  For Santa, you base coat your beard and hair a grey color, then dilute white paint and slightly go over the grey with an almost white wash.  The rake brush really gives the appearance of hair!

While I don't have any step by step instructions, I would add that if you want to add texture to the "fur" of a Santa hat, or add snow to an art object, Snow-Tex is an awesome and easy to use product!

Making Candles!

As a maker of soap and lotion, I knew I wanted to make candles when I saw pins on Pinterest.  This was my first attempt.

I bought some soy flakes off ebay.  Big mistake.  The soy was good, Golden brands 464, but the transaction...not so good.  Anyway...

First I hot glued the wicks (make sure you get the right size for the opening of your jar) into the bottom of my jars.

Then, I melted the wax in an old rice cooker.  It worked great!  BUT, you must watch it and make sure you remove it from the heat source as soon as it gets to about 180 degrees. Use a thermometer.  Can't stress that enough!

Then, I make my mistake.

I used a water based colorant to color the wax, FIGURING that if it worked with soap and lotion (oil based) it should work with candles.  Nope.  Left little clumps of colorant that I had to strain with cheese cloth.  No pictures of this little mistake as it took two hands to fix my mess.  You'll see my boo boo, as in flakes in my candle, in a picture to come.

I found a great place for supplies and oil based colorant, Candles and Supplies

The Family Table

A few months back, I got it into my head to make a "Family Table".  My kid's are getting older, and some of our best and fondest memories have occurred around the Family Dinner table.  I didn't realize how "sentimental" it would become, until my husband, Eric, took a job requiring him to travel.  Now, when we sit down for our evening meal, he's still with us!  Sort of...!

What I forgot to do was to take a picture of the table and chair. Anyway, I bought a black one at a yard sale for $30!

My husband, who is the "World Finest Spray Painter" (no exaggeration) was who I enlisted to paint the table.  He has painted numerous items and the man NEVER has his paint to run.  I bow to the master.

I knew I wanted to use different "Crowns" that were available from The Graphics Fairy.

We each chose different "Crowns" from her website.  I then typed each name of our family and placed them under our chosen "Crowns".  After, I printed them off on the laser printer and transferred them to the table using the Citrasolv Method.

I liked how the crowns looked, but I felt the names needed to be "crisper".  So, I went over the names with Sharpies, hoping the sealer wouldn't smear!

I then decided the table would look better if I painted the lip of the table in dark black acrylic paint.

IMPORTANT POINT!!!

I forgot to add that I sealed the table using 5 (yes 5) coats of Minwax Polycrylic.  After 5 coats I was still concerned if the water based finish would be strong enough.  So, on went two coats of Polyurethane!  It has already turned yellow.  (I had a caddy in the center and you can see the outline).  I removed the caddy, and it seems to be fading, but I'm afraid we will eventually have a yellow top table!