a touch of fall

In honor of my favorite season, I thought I would just share a wallhanging I sewed and quilted years ago. Happy Fall, friends!

personalized vanity

As a little girl, I always wanted a vanity. Of course, back then I had a little different taste and wanted a huge bright one that all the glamorous stars supposedly have to do their stage make up and hair in front of. Thankfully as I got older, my taste got a little better, but I still wanted a vanity so I decided to just make my own. Not too long ago, I was out thrifting with a friend and found an old sewing machine table at the Goodwill for only $26. For those of you who do not know, antique sewing machines actually fold up until a small desk. I knew that not only was it a unique find, but it would be just perfect to use as my a vanity and I could create my own.

I first sanded the table, inside and out. Then I painted it with my favorite type of paint: Annie Sloan's Chalk Paint. While this paint is difficult to find, it is definitely worth the search. It is often sold in antique stores. I recommend checking out her website and seeing if there are any locations near you that hold it: www.anniesloan.com. She also gives really helpful tips if you are having a hard time using her product. I will warn you it is a bit pricey, but I would like to also emphasize that a little goes a long way with this type of paint. After a few coats of paint, I lightly sanded edges and the top of the table to give it an antique touch. I then finished it with a coat of Annie Sloan's wax. It isn't necessary, but it definitely gives it a nice finished touch.

Last, but not least, I added a mirror and a chair and my sewing table became my own personal vanity.

doily dreamcatcher

One of my best friends was amazing and came to see me just about every day when I was back at home on "house arrest" after my surgery. She brought me all kinds of craft supplies and projects to keep me entertained. This was one of them so I'm going to go ahead and give credit to one of my best and longest friend, Evann. The one we worked on together actually turned out like this though:

There are all kind of different materials you could use to make this so use your imagination. I used an embroidery hoop, a doily, yarn, lace, pendents, feathers, and seashells, which I found all at Joanne's craft store. The first thing I actually did was dip feathers in a gold metallic paint and laid them out to dry.

Then I started on the actually dreamcatcher itself by attaching the doily to my hoop. Looking back, I could have probably done it in zigzags to give it more of a dreamcatcher look, but this is how I did it:

Then I took my strips of lace and yarn and attached it to the bottom so it would look cleaner in the end. 

Then I simply wrapped the entire hoop with yarn.

Now you can decorate it however you want! I added two more hanging strands to the bottom.  I wanted a variety of things hanging so I braided strands of yarn. Then I hot glued seashells and starfish to my strips of lace and tied little bottles and feathers to the single strands of yarn.

I also sewed bird pendants to my doily like this:

This is just how mine turned out, but you could really attach all kinds of things to your dreamcatcher to make it your own.