Plug Art Tutorial

Here's a fun little project to dress up your wall outlets. A little spot of creativeness in an unexpected place!

Supplies: Wood pieces, scrap papers-stickers-or other ephemera, acrylic paint, mod podge, E6000, paintbrush/foambrush, pencil, plastic safety plug.
After you've mapped out your design, paint the back & sides of your wood piece. Oh, about the wood pieces: I got mine at a craft store (like Michael's) & they come in all sorts of shapes: flowers, butterflies, circles, rectangles, ovals, animals, etc. And, they're only about 25cents each! (I like using the rectangle shape the best because it covers both wall plugs.)


Trace your shape onto paper & cut it out.



Apply your decoupage medium to the front of the wood piece (the unpainted side).

Press your paper firmly, & rub, to get out any air bubbles.

If you have a little bit of paper hanging over, you can snip off the excess.

I glued glitter onto some of the paper.

When the piece is dry, cover the front & back with a coat of decoupage medium.

Embellish with stickers, papers, stamps, buttons, or other decorative bits.

When it's ALL dry, glue on a plastic safety plug with the E6000. I have found my plugs in the baby department of Walmart & Toys R Us, near the bottles & next to the other child safety equipment & baby-proofing accessories.

I do not recommend these be used if you have small children. Attaching the plugs to the wood pieces actually makes it easier for small hands to pull out of the wall outelts.

You can also paint designs onto the wood instead of using the decoupage method.

Have fun!

1 Hanger 3 Ways Tutorial

This tutorial will be a little bit different than my usual tutes. Rather than show you the supplies used & give pictorial steps along the way, I'm mostly just gonna TELL you how to make 'em. Why? Because I made these a couple years ago. I realized the other day how truly handy they are & thought I'd share. I use mine all the time.
The first thing you'll do is get your basic wooden hanger & paint it up in your favorite color. After painting, I distressed mine with a bit of sandpaper & smeared stain on it to give that "aged" appearance. After applying some flowers found from scrapbook paper, (using mod-podge--a decoupage medium) I finished it off with some furniture wax.

The opportunities are endless as far as embellishments. You could paint a design, use stickers, etc. The little ribbon trim at the top adds a sweet touch. And that's it! (These 3 pair are what's left from a batch of hangers sold 2 years ago, & still available for purchase if anyone is interested! Is that totally tacky to say in the middle of a tutorial? Who cares. It's my blog. I can do what I want. HAHA!)

Hanger #2: Clippie Keeper

I have this hanging in my girls bathroom---at just the right height for them to grab some clippies or bobbies for their hair in the morning.

Simply cut 4 equal lengths of ribbon (or more, depending on how wide your ribbon is & how many clippies you want to hang). The ideal width is 1- 1 1/4". Make sure the ribbon is not too wide so that your clippie doesn't clip around it. (These bobbies are from Little Daisy Chains. The alien one is my fave!)

Here is a backside view so you can see how I attached the ribbon to itself with hot glue.

Hanger #3: Belt Organizer

This one takes a little bit more time but it's well worth the effort! My hubby has always had his very own belt organizer. You know, a real manly one. I didn't want a manly one. I wanted a cute one. I never could find one. So I made my own!

Drill small holes, equal lengths apart, along the bottom rod of your hanger. Try not to drill all the way through. If you do, no biggie. Screw "cup hooks" into the pre-drilled holes.

Hang your belts & you're good to go!

Happy hanger-ing!