Sun Garden Art

Monday I decided that this would be the week that I cleared out my easy peasy projects from my "things I WILL make" board on Pinterest.  I did good on Monday and finished one project. Well yesterday I got distracted by a million things and didn't get another one of my Pinterest projects completed.  Dang.  But today I finished 2 projects - one whole project and two half projects. 

The one I finished is a combination of two inspirations, so technically doesn't count as knocking one off of my "things I will make" board.  But I don't think that anyone is keeping score but me.  I will forgive myself. 

I wanted to make something like this:  

This lovely piece was made by Ingrid Jensen.  She runs a little company called Wood & Wool Stool in the Netherlands.  She makes stuff - like this, and stools) out of recycled wood. You can check her stuff out on her blog wood & wool stool.

I scavenged through my basement looking for scraps of wood.  I found a little - including some scraps from the rough hewn oak I used to expand my fireplace mantel. My mind started telling me that this wood didn't really "go with" the other scraps I had. My mind also told me that instead of separate words, I should use one of the quotes I had on my "i've been thinking" board.  I agreed with my mind that this was a good idea.  Then we agreed that the wider, bigger, older wood would be good to use for the quotation rather than the other wood.  It is good to be in agreement with your mind.  Besides, I can now go ahead and make one of the original pieces with the wood I'm not using.

Anyway, I picked my quote:

Isn't it wonderful?  It leaves me speechless.

Sometime in the middle of the night, my mind started nudging me again - saying things like "you should cut those boards in the shape of the sun!" and "you could use wood scraps to make the suns rays and paint them yellow!" My mind uses exclamation marks all the time because it thinks it is really genius and has great ideas. 

I couldn't think of any better ideas, so I set out to satisfy my minds desire. 

This is what I did.

• Cut up three pieces of the oak with a chop saw.  I cut miter cuts on the ends of the boards for the top and bottom so that when they were put together they would look almost round.
• used two scrap molding pieces to hold front pieces together
• trimmed the "stop sign" into a shape more closely resembling a circle with a jig saw.  I didn't take pictures of this because it would just be dangerous.
• Cut a bunch of angled slices of wood for sunbeams. 

Then I brought it inside because it was really hot outside in the sun today.   I used stamps with paint applied to them to put the quote on the wood.  Rough sawn wood is really hard to paint letters on.  Bummer.  I didn't space it very good either.  Bummer 2.

I glued on the sunbeams with a hot glue gun and painted them yellow(ish).

I remembered that I had not put the authors name on the quote and had to figure out a way to get his name on - hmmmm.  Good thing I had all that extra space at the top - so I put it there.

Hang it up.  DONE.  It's perfectly imperfect.

I will hang it outdoors this summer.

I think it is ruggedly handsome.  What do you think? 

Did you take anything off your Pinterest list today?  Get busy!

Make something wonderful today!

Karen

Linking to these parties:

Spring Fling Paint Projects@thrifty decor chick
 Pinterest Party@Trendy Treehouse
Sunday Showcase@Under the Table and Dreaming
Center of Attention@Center of Attention Deficit Disorder
Sat Nite Special@Funky Junk
Live Laugh Linky Thursday@Live, Laugh, Rowe 
Tickled Pink Friday@504 Main
Inspiration Friday@Beyond the Picket Fence
RRR {transformation} Link Party@ The Rooster and the Hen
Feathered Nest Friday@French Country Cottage
Spring Craft Link Party@Centsational Girl

SYS Blog Link@Somewhat Simple

Treasure Hunt Thursday@From My Front Porch to Yours

Hookin up with HoH@House of Hepworths