Re-purposing can be so much fun!

One of my favorite things to do 

is to find a cheap item at a yard sale or at a thrift shop 

and turn it around into something fun or useful.   

The two items here were turned into fun and decorative re-dos. 

The lamp shade was $1.99 at a thrift shop

and the clock was a yard sale find for $5.

 I added this photo to my post 
because I know there will be someone 
that notices it in the background of 
the last photo and will be curious 
to what it is.  
Well, it is a painting that I did 
on a door in my kitchen that leads to 
the hot-water-tank closet.  
The funny thing about this chef is 
that I worked on him a good eight hours.  
Then a few days after I had finished 
painting him, I spotted him 
out of the corner of my eye 
and jumped a blooming mile.  
I thought for a moment that a stranger 
was in our house, LOL.

On the lampshade re-do, 
I first removed the cloth from the wire.

Next I wrapped the wire in a fuzzy white yarn.

I'll bet some of you were big fans 

of  Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion magazine.

I loved that magazine and was so sad 
when they decided to stop publishing it.
One of my favorite things about 
the magazine was the paper doll 
that was hidden between 
 the pages each month.  
I think one of the reasons I loved 
it was because it brought back wonderful 
childhood memories of Mom's McCall's 
magazine and the Betsey McCall paper dolls 
that were in every issue.  
I think I looked more forward to it arriving
 in the mail, than Mom did.

To make my paper doll mobile, 

I cut out paper dolls from my saved issues of Home Companion.

Then cut out the clothes and 

glued them onto the doll.

Next I glued that to a sheet 

of printed card stock.

Now my doll was thick from three layers 

of paper and she had a pretty print 

paper on her back side.

A small hole punch into her forehead, 

for a string, and she was ready to 

attach to the mobile.

I also added a ribbon with paper hearts 
down the middle and a silk rose 
hot glued in the center of my lampshade.  

This is a view from under the mobile.  
The way a child would see it if it were 
hanging over their bed. 

 

The following photos are a few 
that I took outside trying to get 
some good light so you would have 
an idea of the finished mobile. 

 

 

 

Here is the finished clock.  All I did was paint it white.

Decoupage some sheet music to the background,

and add a clip art of the Eiffel Tower from Graphics Fairy
http://graphicsfairy.blogspot.com/

to give it a French Country flare. 

I hope you enjoyed these little re-do projects.

I sure had fun making them.

I'm hoping my granddaughters will like the mobile.