Pallet Christmas Tree

I made this for my sister this year.  It was super simple to make.  The stencil we found at Wal-mart and then I took apart a pallet and cut each piece to fit each phrase.  Tape the stencils to the piece of wood (make sure it's all covered so the paint doesn't run) and then spray paint.  Remove tape and stencils then attach each piece to your base wood which also doubles as the tree "stem."  Then Polyurethane - I like the spray paint kind and attach a picture hanger or drill a hole in the back.

I think my sis really likes it because now it hangs year round in her house!

Chiminea Cover

One of the things that really bothered me about the Chiminea is when it rained all the ashes or sticks we were storing in it got wet.  So we cut a circle in a piece of wood to cover it.  Now it has a rain guard and you can put pretty flowers on top!

Pallet Deck

We moved into a house that had a dilapidated patio and a serious mud issue.  Our solution?  Pallets!!!  As you can see from the first picture, we reinforced the pallets with 2x4s and then attached 1x strips in the gaps.  We did each pallet individually so that it was truly a movable deck.  This deck, our savior, cost about $75 in materials!

Directions:

Once you find your pallets (lots of people just give them or away, or sell them for $1 each on craigslist), measure to see how long/ wide a deck you will want.  Also, since pallets vary so much, you will need to see how sturdy they are, and if the gaps between each piece of wood are too big to have furniture moving back and forth without catching (that was the case with the pallets we had).  As you can see from the picture below, the pallets we had only had 1 2x4 in the middle (making it very unsturdy) and they had pretty big gaps in between each piece of wood.

Since it was a 2x4 in the middle, that is what we bought to reinforce each side.  We cut them to length and stood each pallet up on its end and pounded them down with a hammer (they are not attached at all as it was very snug fitting them).  This took care of the sturdiness problem - we no longer had any worries someone would jump up on the deck and break a piece of wood with their weight!  Here you can see there are now 3 2x4s in the pallet.

Then, to take care of the gaps on top, I went to Lowe's and found rounded 1xs that fit in between each gap on top.  (Tip:  Measure the smallest gap between your pieces of wood so you know it will fit each one).  We cut each one of those to size, pre-drilled holes in them (important so they don't crack!) and attached those with screws.

Then, you sand, stain, paint or whatever you want.

Our deck was a total of 12 individual pallets put together.  We had pavers we leveled up (with all of the mud of course!) and put a corner on each one.  Meaning the the pavers for the center of the deck held 4 different corners of 4 different pallets; the end pieces utilizing an entire paver itself.

And Done!

Coca-Cola Stool

I made this for my step-mom one year.  They had this super cool Coca-Cola themed kitchen and I thought that I would make her this to sit on while she was at the counter.  Little did I know she wouldn't use it!  The actual "C" in the beginning of Coca-Cola is free-hand, but the rest was easy!  Just Google the "Coca-Cola" font, print it to size, then trace it out!  I thought it ended up looking like an old school button.

Scarecrows

A friend of mine gave me these scarecrow heads, and one rainy day we all decided to paint our own.  Our version of folk art!

Cupboard

This was the most simple thing to make!  I bought a pre-made cupboard from Michael's, painted it.  Then I took the door off to paint the roses!  No, I'm not an artist, but it was a present for my sister-in-law and her favorite flowers are roses.  Super cute with sunflowers!

Guitar Stand

This is actually one of those home-made Christmas gifts that we make every year, this one in particular from one of the babies, hence the Jackson Pollock paint scheme.  Not a bad present from a 2-year old!

Step1:  Find a large piece of wood.  We had MDF, so we used MDF.
Step2:  Find a template trace, cut and sand.  A good place to find one is Here.
Step3: Paint and decorate then seal.  I like the spray can stuff best!
Step4: Place felt on where guitar will rest.

And Done!!!!