Tea Towel Art

A while back I discovered a fabulous Etsy shop, Fresh Pastry Stand. The shop owner/creator, Deva Mirel, makes amazing vintage-inspired housewares, from beeswax candles shaped like antique bottles and cake stands made of vintage plates to Pyrex tea towels!

Being a true Pyrex fanatic, I knew I had to snatch one up for myself. With some Christmas money I bought myself the Butterprint tea towel, which was at the time the only print available. Then I checked back into her shop months later, only to see that she'd added Pink Gooseberry, Friendship, and more! Even though my other tea towel was back in Kansas City, I decided to treat myself to two more towels and make them a trio.

I chose a pink Gooseberry towel and a red towel featuring two vintage milk bottles. And once they arrived I realized they were much too pretty to actually use, so I chose to frame them instead!

This project did confirm one thing for me: when shopping for frames, if at all possible, bring the art you plan to frame with you so that you can better visualize it inside its future home. Silly me--even though my tea towels are easy to travel with, I neglected to stick them in my purse when I went shopping the first time around. Thus I ended up with two gray faux-barnwood frames from Michael's, scooped up for $44 total during a half off frames sale.

They were quite large and had a great weathered look to them, but something about their blue-ish undertones just wasn't right to me. It kind of made the unbleached tea towels look dirty/yellowy because the two tones were competing, not complementing each other. Kinda like how red lipstick can make teeth look yellowed.

Enter this lovely natural wood frame from Target ($19.99). Originally I bought two to frame my Macklemore Challenge photos from Goodwill ($4.99 for both. Woot!)

The photos looked good in there, but then I realized the tea towels might look even better.

I used the true lazy man's way and just popped the new, lighter frame around the already-framed towels to see if the whole image would fit and how the colors looked. That way, if I decided to stick with the gray frames after all, I wouldn't have to re-frame the towels.

I loved the lighter wood frames right away. They matched the yellow undertones of the natural linen towels so nicely! Another bonus? I was going to have to attach a sawtooth picture hanger to the back of the gray frames, because when wrapped around the backing the tea towels covered the existing hanger:

But my lighter frames had the picture hangers on the actual wood, so the tea towels wouldn't cover them!

Oh, and I didn't cut the towels down to size or anything, in case I want to do something different with them in the future. I just used the backing of the frames and wrapped it like a present, making sure to center the design on the front. The fabric was light enough that I could fit the backing into the frame's grooves so that the glass is secure.

The tea towel art lives over my yellow table where my map previously stayed--as you could see in the living room tour, I relocated the map there.

I love how it looks with the wreath and table.

And the red in the milk bottle towel really looks great with all the red accents in my corner shelf.

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Once we're back in KC in our new place, I plan on buying another identical frame to house the Butterprint tea towel I got for Christmas. And maybe I'll even buy another one to make a set of four? We'll see.

Anyone else framing items as art? Do share!

Tiny Tweaks

As you can tell from my pantry re-organization post shared Monday, lately projects around my place haven't been major undertakings, but just little tweaks to current rooms. I'm here today to share a few of those tweaks, all involving the addition of a little art to brighten up some empty apartment corners!

First up, some laundry room love. I found three cool vintage laundry-related pictures from The Graphics Fairy, an awesome site for finding free printable art! I had a trio of frames (previously in my bathroom) that were empty, so I printed the iron, ironing board, and washbasin pictures, popped them in, and hung them up over our washer & dryer. I dream of having one of those beautiful laundry rooms someday--like this or this or this--and these prints will look lovely in a space like that :)

Another area that received a little tweak was the new corner gallery wall in our bedroom. As I was staring at the area one day, I remembered a little wooden shelf I'd bought during my first trip to Echo Echo. I'd loved the little guy for just $5, but had never found a home for him. But he fits right in here!

I liked adding some 3-D objects to the gallery wall for more interest. You might recognize the tree (a $0.99 Goodwill find) and clock (also $0.99) from my thrift recaps earlier this year. I like how the gold helps tie in the gold from the frame and Montana art.

Another gallery wall that received some attention is my kitchen Happy Wall. Can you spy the changes?

 

Let's start in the upper left corner. I spray-painted the little square frames I scored for $0.69 at Goodwill and popped in a tomato soup can label that I'd saved to frame. It was an Andy Warhol anniversary edition one sold at Target last year. It fits right in with the color scheme of the whole gallery wall and also brings out the red in the striped mat.

And in the opposite corner I framed another Graphics Fairy print--a Ball Ideal jar with wire closure. 

The Graphics Fairy strikes again! I also printed this art depicting different types of arm fractures and hung it up in our bathroom.

Now I'm off to go enjoy the lovely Montana weather! Hope your weekends go great!

A Look at Our Living Room

As I teased in last week's Fab Finds Friday post, some of my thrifty finds have been placed in new living room vignettes. After taking down my Christmas and Valentine decor, I was definitely ready to switch things up in there!

As a refresher, check out this post to see what our living room looked like earlier this year (I love a good before and after!) And now, here's what it looks like now:

And here are all the lovely little details:

{Coffee table: from my mother-in-law // Decorative balls: Pier1 and Ross // Oval tray: Ross}

{Rhino: $5.99, TJ Maxx // Books: Design Sponge at Home // Rustic Wedding Chic // Young House Love}

{Etched lantern: $2.99, Goodwill // Wedding Photo Book // Missouri Review}

{Futon: Small Wonders Futons}

{Bookshelf: Target // Bird Art: Target (a gift from my wonderful sister) // Globe: $14, Montana Antique Mall}

{Tree votive holders: $0.99 each, Goodwill // Antique shipping routes map: $25, Rocky Mountain Maps // Frame: Walmart // Bird: $0.99, Goodwill}

{Books: $1.49 each, Goowdill}

{Clock & letterpress apostrophe: River Market Antiques // White Butterfly: Target // Cheese dome: $1.99, Goodwill // Moss Rocks: Ross //  White Bird: $3.99, TJ Maxx} 

{"V" art: Prairie Sisters vintage market // Small globe: Ross // Letterpress R: River Market Antiques // Vintage camera: thrifted // Wooden fruit: $2.50, Goodwill}

{Gunlocke Chair: Prairie Sisters vintage market // Stars: Ross // Wii storage ottoman: Walmart // State pillows: Uncommon Goods (gifted from my awesome mama // Quatrefoil pillows: Sewed by my sister // Frames: Walmart}

{Map: $15, thrifted // Console table: $70, Roomer's Consignment Gallery // Bookends: Gift from husband's grandparents // Jar: $5, thrifted // Frame: TJ Maxx // Parking meter: Gift from White Elephant exchanged // White vase: Ross // Baskets: Michaels}

{Chunky candlesticks: $1.49 each, Goodwill // Candles: Target // Stained glass lantern: $1.99, Goodwill // Window: $20, Echo Echo Furniture // Small painting: $0.99, Goodwill // Gold letter "N": Prairie Sisters vintage market // Iron & glass candleholder: $5.99, thrifted // Lamp: Pier1}

{Globe: $14, Montana Antique Mall // Frames: TJ Maxx // Aqua tray: $0.99, thrifted // Candle: Target}

{Blue jar: Target // Berries: Target // Pillar holder: $1.49, Goodwill // Oil-rubbed bronze lantern: $2.99, Goodwill}

{Lantern: Michaels // Vase: Ross // "13" Letterpress numbers: Preserve Cottage on Etsy}

I am seriously loving how "done" the living room looks now. To some people it might look a little crowded/cluttered (especially since it's a smaller space), but I've always loved a collected, "filled" look (like Candace Olsen if she were a flea market frequenter). Once we have a bigger living space I'm sure I'll spread out my surface decorating a bit more :) I am excited to move back home but kinda bummed to pack this all away. Then again, I will have a whole new space to decorate and share! Wahoo!

Linking to these parties: