During my summer vacation, I've been slowly working on some handmade decor for the baby's room. I really wanted to make a decorative letter for her room and as always Pinterest is a great resource. I decided to give it a weathered look and used what I had in my stash.
Here's how I made mine: 1) I first painted a base coat of wicker white (2 coats) and then hand-stamped "Homemade with Love" with black ink over the dried base coat. 2) Once the stamping is completely dry, I brushed a heavy layer of crackle medium over the letter (let it dry 'til it has a tacky consistency). 3) I evenly painted one top coat* of Martha Stewart's "Beach Glass" (love this color!). * Note: do not re-paint or try to go over certain areas, you'll end up smudging the crackle medium and undoing the crackling effect. 4) For the border of the letter I inversed the colors - Beach Glass base coat, crackle layer, white top coat 5) To help prevent chipping and yellowing, I sealed the paint using Liquidex Satin Varnish (3 thin coats). On the inside of the "P" I cut and glued a strip of pink gingham fabric as a contrasting accent to the seafoam color. I also recycled a crochet rosette I had leftover from my baby shower (I had made them as brooches for my guests). I'm so happy with the result, the crackling effect came out great . . .
So great, I wanted to replicate the same weathered look on my birdhouses. I followed the same painting process and covered the roof tops with calico fabric. I highly recommend using Martha Stewart acrylics for this project (other brands did not work as well with the crackle medium). My color palette was Beach Glass, Raspberry Ice, and Chamomile.
I really loved working on these projects; they were fairly easy to do, came out so cute and were affordable to make. This a testament that decorating a room doesn't always require you to go out and spend tons of money. Being resourceful can go along way, don't ya think? Sue
