"Be Prepared"

Almost all of my family is once again either out of town or STILL out of the country so I am trying to find things I want to do to stay busy this week. As much as I would love to be outside in the gardens, if you don't get out there really early-and then back in quickly-it is just too hot to be enjoyable. And so, of course, I think next about crafts. I do have a few large projects looming but I'm waiting for the pool install to be complete so my mind will be free to move along-but, I digress!

Since I have decided what I want to do for Halloween and have purchased all of the items needed to begin, I was on my way in that direction when I remembered that my 4th decor will be coming down pretty soon. The rest of July and all of August usually means sunflowers in my house. To many people, sunflowers "say" autumn-and, if I was being honest, they probably do to me as well-but, I am going with the SUN part of the word and using them to represent summer. They are yellow and look like the sun...which is hot...and so is summer...do you see where I'm going? Lol

And then I remembered that since I'm not putting the wreaths or metal basket full of flowers on the front door any more-thanks to the world's biggest tree frog taking up residence every time I do-that I would need a new burlap hanger. And so, off to my Pinterest boards I go and find some sunflower hangers that I am OK with. As always, mine will be somewhere in between but I always seem to need a jumping off spot.

And so I got going. Luckily, I had a new bottle of a sunflower yellow that I bought for dots on the witch's hats so I could start right away. As always, I started by drawing a pattern on kraft paper, pinning it to the burlap and cutting it out. Then, I gave both sides a quick spray with a clear acrylic sealer. That is what I did way back on my very first one and since it worked then, I have continued to do it. I think it closes up the roughness of the burlap and fills in any of the really wide openings in the weave.

I have one coat on in this picture and have used the entire, brand new bottle of paint! I am going to wait and see how it dries before I decide if I will put on a second coat.

So, it did not need a second coat. The color intensified perfectly. I bought a dark brown paint for the flower center and a lighter brown to delineate the leaves. But when I used the lighter color it came out too intense for me. When I painted the inner circle, the two colors were almost the same so...

...I mixed some of the light brown with the yellow and I am much happier with the color contrast. But, I am still not crazy about the whole thing. I wish I had put 8 leaves all coming out of the center but, as you well know, measuring is NOT my forte!! I could not seem to get that worked out (within the confines of the desired 18" size) no matter how many times I tried. The leaves were too small and it just didn't look right. And so, it is what it is! I'm pretty sure anyone looking at it will know it is supposed to be a sunflower.

My next hanger will be a leaf (with maybe a dangling acorn) for September. That is when I take down the sunflowers and put out my pumpkins and leaves....and, begin to BREATHE again!!

It is now the next morning. Those of you who are loyal readers of this blog-and a bit intuitive-may know where this is going! When I am "not crazy" about something, it usually continues to niggle at my brain. I could not get the mis-step on my design of this sunflower out of my head. As soon as my feet hit the ground this morning-and, I had a cup of caffeine coffee, I was back at the drawing board. I knew I could work it out. My mistake had been in folding the paper into sections so I could cut once and have even petals. Once I got over that, I simply sketched out what I wanted and THEN could fold the paper and get things even.

At this point, I truly thought I would be tossing the old one. For some reason I looked very closely at it before I did and I realized that I still had the same number of "points"-they were just thinner and placed differently. That meant with a little trimming, I could use the same burlap. I am going to turn the old sunflower over, paint the other side a solid brown and now use it for the back of the hanger. The old back will now become the front...got that? Lol

This is where I am now...watching paint dry! So I am off to get a few things done and the next time we "talk", I hope I can show you the finished product...one that will please my sense of symmetry. Can you spell OCD? Lol Stay tuned.