Desperate Times...

...call for desperate measures. Is this the favorite thing I have ever done? No. Is it even in the top 10? 20? No. But, it did provide me the crafty time that I so enjoy so it is not a total fail!

I almost always have a hard time finding new craft ideas that I want to do for the 4th of July. I have been crafting for so long that I have already done most of the ideas that come down the pike and finding something new is just hard. And so, when I saw what one of the blogs I follow was making with what they called a "spindle" Uncle Sam, I thought it was different and not so "cutesy" and that I might give it a try.

I found out two things. My Lowes does not carry the "spindle" she used and, in reality, it is not a spindle but a furniture leg...at least in my store. Once I found the closest thing I could find, I grabbed it up and thought I could work with it. But, when I got it home and actually started thinking about the placement of his different parts, I thought it was just too big! By the time I got a hat on this guy, he would have been just too tall to fit into any of the shelves I was considering.

And so, out came my trusty miter saw once again and I cut one of the sections out and glued it back together.

I had all of my supplies on the table in the sunroom and found that I would do a step, head out to the garden for a few hours, come back in and do another little something...and so on. In all of that, I didn't take many pictures but, it is basically a painting project with a few other little things along the way.

The hat that I had seen was made from cardboard and a TP holder. I am not a fan of seeing the side of cardboard on craft projects so I was going to buy a wood round to use as the brim. Except, my HL was out of them. I decided to buy a painted round shape and thought I was lucky to have found the perfect size...except that now that I have it all together, I think it is too large. I have it glued together with just a drop of hot glue just in case I happen upon the right sized disc.

The painted disc I used was made up of two thin discs so I pried them apart. I used the one for the brim and I cut small rounds out of the other to use as the top of the hat on the TP holder. I am also not a fan of seeing the "wrap" of the TP roll once it is painted so I covered the roll with card stock before I painted it.

Once he was painted, I sanded him a bit to distress and then wiped him down with my antiquing gel.

Since I wanted the vintage look, I dipped some cotton balls into coffee and spread them out to dry.

Then it was a simple matter of two black dots for eyes and the cotton balls glued on as hair, mustache and beard. I also put a bit of silver tinsel around the hat. At this point I was almost wishing that I had cut down the TP roll because that hat is just so tall. I found a free download, printed it out and glued it on the hat to break up the height a little.

Like I said, he is certainly not my favorite but, when I discovered that he does fit on the very large shelf of the TV armoire - a shelf that is hard for me to fill because small things just get lost on it - I am a bit happier with him. We'll see how I finish off this shelf soon.

I woke up to rain this morning but it is beautiful out there now so I am off to see what else I can get off of my list. Stay safe and stay tuned. 

So I have an update! As I was walking past my Uncle Sam just now, that mustache just didn't look right. I googled Uncle Sam images and almost everyone I found did NOT have a mustache. When I searched on Pinterest, some of the wood ones did have a mustache but, I decided to err on the side of the vintage images and get rid of the stache! Luckily, it was a simple task of just pulling it down to the beard. Ah...so much better! Lol Now I will be able to sleep tonight!