Stars and Stripes

The Fourth of July is right around the corner now (how can that be????), so in honor of that great day I finally got around to doing a project I've been thinking about since THIS project began! (And believe me it's moving slow....)

Do you know what you get when you tear down a century old ceiling (or rather a fifty year old ceiling that covers a century old ceiling? Lathe. Lots of it. Now being the thrifty gal I try to be, I can't just throw it away, now can I? My husband disagrees.

One person's trash is another's treasure, dear.



What do all these long, thin strips make you think of? Or maybe I'm the only nut that sees this. A flag!




So here we go......lay out the pieces...13 stripes on the flag.....7 red.



At this point we are just winging it....stick with me folks. I had a few short pieces (broken to be exact) so those were relegated to the "blue" portion of the flag. Tape off, cover the adjacent areas.

Spray blue. Remove tape.

Trim off unsightly (too long) ends....by hand...with a real saw, 'cause that's how I roll.

(And I was too lazy to go to the garage to use the chop saw.)

Now, flip the whole show over onto its front.

Now the fun part....the staple gun. If you don't have one I highly suggest you run out right now and purchase one. They are great fun....but be sure to buy this kind...so physics work with you and not against you. ;-)

I untwisted some inexpensive rope, used one strand and started stapling to the back.
Oh, and I think I forgot to mention, the "white" stripes are just negative space...my house is white, so it works. You could TOTALLY use more strips though and have white stripes. I wasn't able to commandeer that many pieces before they so egregiously made their way to the dumpster.

Keep stapling. I used one strand on each end and one on the blue portion.

Like this.

Blue portion....staple A LOT...it gets windy in Iowa.

Now we need a way to hang our beautiful creation. Rope, staples, you're good to go.

Hang it on the house to paint the stars. It was just easier than leaning over.

Here she is with the little "kitchen garden". No stars yet.

Once again, I tend to do things quick and dirty...I'm an instant gratification kind of girl. Projects must be squished into naptime, so we don't have a lot of time to mess around. I grabbed a sticky note, drew on a star, cut out with an exacto and VOILA, stencil (and it sticks to the flag!).

Dry brush the little stars on.

And yes, in the United States of Jen there are 33 states....I know you counted. ;-) Let's pretend the year is 1859 and Oregon was just admitted to the Union.

We're ready for the 4th! Maybe I'll try to squeeze a couple more patriotic projects in before next week.....I've got some SUPER talented bloggy friends that have me completed inspired.

I mean seriously....check out this and this!!!!

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