Framed Letter Friday Reveal

A quick thank you to Lanie and her SUPER entertaining blog, Life in the Pitts, for featuring my little solar lights -- she's a crafty, yet really funny blogger, and you should definitely check her out.  Thanks, Lanie!!






We had some good guesses and a lot of right answers this week on the letters (sometimes the pics are just too obvious!)

Maria at You Craft Me Up was oh-so-close on the "E" (plus she totally gave me the idea to use a part from my chandelier in the future!)

Inspired by You guess was spot on this week on our "I" -- Woo Hoo!! :)  

Elizabeth at Habitually Crafty got the "wrought iron something" right for the "E" -- okay I couldn't resist -- it made me laugh!

Thanks for the guesses, Ladies -- and here's the answers







L:  Although it definitely looked like a photo frame, it was our railing for the stairs






I:  You guys guessed it!  It was a pull from a my recent lamp project.

V:  The Solar Light from the House Number Planter Box.








E:  Our "wrought iron something!"  It's a candle-hangy-thing that I don't really know what to do with -- I may be ditching it soon. Hmmmm.










All that to make up:

Framed Letter Friday

Okay, well just a few "thank yous" and wonderful blogs to mention before today's Framed Letters.

First, Rachelle at Fingerprints on the Fridge is having a "Feature Yourself Friday" today! You should check out all the wonderful projects people have submitted!  She was just a doll and featured my PB table lamp -- thank you, thank you, Rachelle!



Have you been to Mary's blog Lil Bit of Us?  Well today she was wonderful enough to feature my solar lights and my pottery barn light from last week.  Isn't she sweet??  She has tons of crafty fun things on her site too!  Thanks, Mary!





 Another AMAZING site is Amy's blog Mod Podge Rocks -- as you can tell I've been a little bit obsessive about my Mod Podge lately -- and this blog takes the cake on Mod Podge Projects.  Amy was also SUPER sweet and shared my solar light project with all her Facebook Friends -- so THANK YOU, Amy!


Now on to our Framed Letter Friday!  I honestly love doing this every week -- hopefully you all do to?  You're not getting bored with all these letters??  Are you ready for a lively bunch of letters this week??? (hmm, that was a lot of questions in a row)

Anyone want to guess what these letters are???  We'll do the reveal a little bit later on this afternoon..so until then!

Caving In

With Father's Day just last weekend, we thought it'd be fun to show you some before and afters of our "Man Cave" room -- you know, the room that houses all the "Manly" items that you can't put in the rest of the house?

Ours has been a work in progress -- and we've been working on transforming it into a good mix of beauty and manliness (sometimes that's tough to do!).

This room is where we watch all our movies, where the hubby hangs out and where we spend a lot of time in the summer (it IS the coolest room in the house, after all!).  But before this was OUR hand-me-down man cave it was a work out/exercise room:

Right away before we moved in we painted the walls (they don't really look quite so bright) and had new carpet put in:

It already looks more "Manly", right?!?  It's stayed this way (plus furniture!) for the last two and half years -- until recently when we finally got around to redoing it a little more.

Our most exciting addition....some celebrities:

We splurged on some of Kevin's favorite classic (is Spaceballs really a classic!?!) movies.  We scoured Amazon for these and found them for about $10.00 a piece.

You can see more about my shelf here , the toy-chest makeover here, and more about the faux six panel doors here.

Now for the next project in this room -- have you seen these AWESOME shelves that Sandra at Sawdust and Paper Scraps built?  Oh, yes you read that right -- she built them.  They are GORGEOUS!  And how perfect would they be to hide all the ugly entertaining equipment?? We'll just tack that on to the never ending to do list!

Solar + Mod Podge = AMAZING

THIS POST IS SPONSORED BY:

When it's June in the Midwest you can only bet that we are outside -- whether it be work, play or relaxation -- you can find us soaking up the sun in the great outdoors.  And since we are spending so much time outside now -- we thought we should definitely invest in some solar lights for the front yard patio.  Have you shopped for these lately?!?  They are like $8.00 - $10.00 per light -- seriously!!  I have been browsing them for months now trying to find a good deal...but no luck so far.  So of course I turned to my trusty blogger friends for some ideas and inspiration......enter these two lovely ladies:

They both had WONDERFUL projects -- and I totally "borrowed" their fabulous ideas and created something new.  So go visit their blogs too and check out their projects:

Heather over at Our Life in a Click did some incredible solar light jars -- for only $6.00!

And at Pam's blog, Gingerbread & Snowflakes  she has a great tutorial on how to "tint" glass! Visit her tutorial -- it's awesome.  (I mentioned this last week on my PB knockoff table lamp).





Okay, are you ready for the project!?!

I picked up a box of wide mouth Mason jars (12 jars for $7.82).

And I already had my food coloring-Mod Podge technique down from  my last project like this.  But just for some additional instructions (you get better each time you do it!) -- here's how I did it:

Pour about a 1/4 cup of  Outdoor Mod Podge onto a plastic plate and add 5 - 7 drops (depending on how light or dark you want your color) of food coloring.  I used McCormick's Neon Food Coloring (except the yellow - which is from a plain old box of food coloring).  BTW - this was MORE than enough of the mixture to cover three glass jars.

Mix it together with a paint brush until it's completely blended.

Then paint it on!

Let it sit for a minute or two.

Take a paper towel and crumple it up.  Dip it into the Mod Podge mixture and stipple the jar until you get the desired look.

 
If anyone else is a "messy crafter" like I am -- here's a tip:  I took an old Crystal Light container and put the jar on top of it.  That way I could hold the end of the container while I kept my hands free and clear of the Mod Podge mixture that was being slathered on my jars.

And don't be frightened if your jars look like this initially:

 Hello Electric Green!  They do mellow out as they dry to look more like this:

Now that the jars are done -- time to add some light!

I picked up these little solar lights at Menards for $2.00 a piece (still wish I would have bought more!)

Then I took the post and clear plastic off -- leaving just the solar top and light.

These lights sit perfectly in the tops of the jars -- they are pretty snug, but hold the light up:

Next step is to wrap some wire around the lip of the jar to hang them from a hook.  I'm thinking you might able to use some sort of twine too?  Just a thought.

I wrapped my wire around a few times and hooked them around each other so that each side had an end of the wire.  Then I twirled them together in the middle to make a handle.  (Make sure your wire is wrapped really tight around the glass).

The last step is to hang them on a hook.  I searched high and low for some sort of shepherd's hook that didn't cost an arm and a leg.  I found these online, but I'm a "results-now" kind of girl -- so I didn't want to wait for them to shipped.    I did happen upon these 18" plant prop rods at Home Depot though.  And for $.74 a pop -- I took twelve!

Simply hook the wire around the loop and you're ready for some night-time light  from your colored jars!

Aren't they cute?  I'm in love with these!  But what's even better is the price:

MATERIALS:

12 pack of wide mouth jars:  $7.82

12 solar lights at $2.00 each:  $24.00

Wire:  Had

Mod Podge:  Had

Food Coloring:  Had

12 Plant Prop Rods at $.74 each:  $8.88

GRAND TOTAL:  $40.70 which means just $3.39 PER LIGHT

Not bad!

And how 'bout a peak at night?

(luckily my talented hubby knows how to take better pictures at night than I do!)

And today I'm linking up to these fun parties!

UPDATE:

 So I have gotten an enormous amount of emails from all the lovely bloggers out in the blogosphere who have had some questions about the Mod Podge Solar Lights -- and I wanted to post a little update to my instructions.

1.  What kind of jars did you use?

I used Ball Pint Sized Wide Mouth Canning Jars:

 I found mine at Menards for $7.00ish -- but if anyone lives by a Fleet Farm, I would try there too. 

2.  What kind of solar lights did you use?

This is kind of hard -- I bought these lights from Menards.  BUT - you don't have to do EXACTLY as I did -- you could use a bigger light and have it sitting on top of the jar -- just leave the plastic case thing on the light so it helps the light stay the jar:

3.  Where do you get outdoor Mod Podge?  

If YOU find out - let me know!  It's something you may have to order online -- I couldn't find it in any stores.  I know Joanne's website has it, but their store didn't.  So -- check around online -- you can probably get it cheaper than in the store too.  Oh - and sadly there are no Hobby Lobby's around me -- but I'm sure they have it.

Feel free to comment or email with any other questions -- I'll do my best to answer -- but I'm no expert!!

If anyone makes these lights -- let me know -- I'd love to show them off on here!