Faux Mercury glass lamps

 I thought I'd share a project I did a few weeks ago with you all! I am sure some of you have probably seen some of the "faux mercury glass" that's been going around. It looks amazing and was supposed to be easy. Now real mercury glass...although gorgeous...has quite the price tag! And if you are like me and have a small budget but a big imagination, you too can have mercury glass! I know that it probably would've been smart to start off with something I didn't really care about..such as a free florist vase...but I'm not always the most logical and I tend to just dive in to projects! I had a couple glass lamps that I was dying to try to make into mercury glass. Here is a tutorial of sorts on how to do what I did.

Materials you will need:
Glass lamp or votive holder or vase
Spray bottle of water
A couple colors of silver spray paint (i used Krylon's Brilliant Silver and Matte Aluminum)
Paper towel for cleaning drips and newspaper for setting stuff on to dry

To get started, you will need to clean the inside and outside of your lamp as well as possible. I used a dry paper towel because mine were mostly clean...just a tad dusty. Once they are clean and dry you will tip the lamp upside down so the open bottom is facing up. Balance the lamp (on top of several sheets of newspaper) resting on the top part that the bulb screws in to..whatever that is called! Take your spray bottle and spray water into the inside of the lamp. The idea is that you want to see visible water droplets on the inside. Right after spraying the water, grab one of your cans of spraypaint and star spraying the paint on the inside only...right over the top of the water drops. I found that the paint will kind of billow around inside of the lamp and then settle after a couple mins. I used one color and sprayed several good sprays inside the lamp, and then grabbed the other color and did the same thing. I then tipped the lamp right side up and let it sit on the newspaper and dry (water and paint will run out...that's ok) After 10 mins or so (it was a warm day so it dried quickly) I came back, tipped it upside down and roughed up the paint with a chopstick (mercury glass looks weathered and uneven and spotty...that's part of the appeal) I made scratches and holes in the paint to give it a distressed look. Then I sprayed it again with water and then did the paint treatment a second time. After I was done I let it dry the same way as before. Make sure that after you tip it right side up and let the water drip out that you clean up any paint that gets on the outside...if you let it dry its a pain to get off.
Let the lamp (or jar or whatever) dry thoroughly and then its ready to use! I absolutely love how this turned out. It was so easy and is really unique looking. This would be great to do to votive holders or wine glasses to make a sparkly holiday centerpiece! If you do this to a candle holder (which I HIGHLY recommend) you will be in Looove! It looks amazing with a tea light twinkling inside! Hope you all give this a try...its so easy and really fun! Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Looong time no post...

Hello all! Sorry for my extreme absence lately! I've been up to my elbows in dirty diapers and totally neglecting my beloved blog! I've been working on a few projects lately that I will be posting pics of once I'm done with them. First off....
My original plan when my baby girl came along was to have her and my 2 year old son share a room. I figured, why not, they'll get used to it and it'll be no big deal for them! Well it was no big deal for her but it was a BIG deal for him! After trying the roommate thing for two nights and having my 2 year old be up till midnight on both nights and waking up at around 6am I had to cut my losses! He just couldn't sleep through her gurgles and little baby noises...nor did he find them as adorable as I do! He loves his sister but he needs his own room. That's just how he is. So we put her in our guest room which is also my sewing room. She's only 3 months...she doesn't need much space...so we kept the full sized guest bed in there and I moved my sewing table into the closet which actually works great! The room is super cute and is a totally combined space that works really well! Granted we haven't had guests sleep in the bed with her in there yet and probably won't, but that bed will come in really handy if she's sick or teething and needs her Mama close by.
I will post pics of her room soon. I'm totally stumped by wall art because I want it to be a room fitting for a baby girl without being too baby-ish...because its also a guest room. Ya know? Its a dilemma!
My next project that I've been working on is transforming my son's room into a "big boy" room! I scored a really nice toddler bed on craigslist for free. Its solid wood and really durable but didn't have all the hardwear, or the slats that the mattress was supposed to sit on, and was really REALLY scratched. I sanded it down and spray painted it with Krylon's Navy Blue. It took 3 and a half cans to get it fully covered! Once it was totally covered and had dried overnight I realized that the color wasn't exactly what I was after. I wanted it to have more of a dusty color and the blue was a little too bright for me. So I dilluted some black paint by half with water and dry brushed it on over the blue. It didn't look like anything at first but once one coat had dried it was exactly the color I had been after! Next I need to find some bedding that I like in the colors that I'm after...its no easy task! I'd love some color help! (The walls of his room are kind of like a key lime pie color. They came with the house and the paint was in good shape and we didn't hate it so it stayed! lol...since I was 8 months pregnant when we moved in...the less I had to do the better! ) The colors that I've chosen for his room are Navy blue, dark red, chocolate brown, and white. I would love to find toddler bedding in a cute plaid or something. Nothing with animals or cartoon characters on it! I don't do themes! And art? And storage? Need all the help I can get!
I hope you all had an awesome Halloween and are hunkering down for the crisp weather that were having! Can't wait for Thanksgiving and Christmas...they are right around the corner!