July Junk Art Creations

My husband and I worked on a lot more refinishing/building projects than junk art in July, but we did finish one junk art project that I’m incredibly proud of—it’s definitely my favorite yet—so I wanted to share it with you.

And then I thought I’d also share the gift that my daughter Danielle and I made for my husband for his upcoming birthday as well. (Once it was made, we couldn’t wait to give it to him, so he’s already seen it. 🙂  )

Without further ado, meet the newest pup in our household…

I’m really proud of this guy because he came purely from my imagination. His muzzle was a candleholder that I bought years ago (and never really loved). When I turned it upside down, I immediately saw that the heart formed a perfect dog muzzle, and the spot for a candle looked like a nose. I debated cutting off the heart handle, but decided it made the tongue more whimsical.

His ears are hinges, and his head is … actually, I’m not sure. A bulb planting thingy? Not sure. He’s got nuts for eyes, obviously. Then his body was an air pump canister. His legs were from big standing candle holders, and his tail was a decorative finial from a curtain rod.

This guy was so fun to design! He now guards our garden from his rock.  🙂

I’ve been working hard lately to get closed-door storage space for the junk that tends to pile up around the house. It seems if there’s a flat surface somewhere it will just end up covered. This is one of the main reasons I wanted the oak cabinet in the kitchen (though it was also so I could bring some of the kitchen stuff we used to store in the basement up.)

But one of my husband’s pet peeves about this was the fact that we no longer had a bowl conveniently located right next to the door for keys. I decided to get him a keyhook organizer for his birthday and found a really cute one on Etsy—but then I thought, Wait, I could make that. And thus a project was born. 

My daughter and I took the basic idea from Etsy and made it our own. First of all, we used a gorgeous multi-colored piece of poplar. We bought poplar for our Mission-style doors and trim project, and some of it had this really pretty coloring. But by the time we stained the wood our trim color, you really couldn’t see that variation anymore. We always said it was a shame—this was a perfect way to actually feature the natural grain of that wood!

We stained the top part of the houses and added bark as doors and to the roofs (they just cut down a ton of trees in the preserve behind our house, so there was plenty of bark right in our backyard). My daughter painted the houses and added little windows, and we used moss to create the bush and the tree. Finally, we added a little fence with nails and wire. (We were going to use nails for chimneys too, like the person on Etsy did but decided that our bark roofs looked decorative enough without them.)

And then we added the key hooks, and that was it!! We were so excited about how well it turned out that we just decided to give it to him right away. We’re thinking of making something similar to hold masks next.

That was our July projects!

Have you been doing anything creative lately? I want to know!