The Bird

This post isn't about that infamous 'bird' some use to communicate "I'm mad at you"...

nor is it about the hundreds of birds that decided to skip migration and land on our grandma's lawn over our Christmas vacation in New York...

but it is about the first ever, homemade artwork I created for our house!  Here's the whole story:

Right after we got hitched, we bought three identical frames from my favorite thrift store ever in Ohio for 25 cents each.  They weren't anything special except that they had ancient pictures in them of people who we had no idea about and they were orange.  Lacking pictures (because we're horrible at remembering to bring our camera when making memories), all we did was display the frames in our hutch...pictures of strangers included.  I can't even begin to count how many times we've been asked who those people were and every time saying "I have no clue" and telling the frame story.  Later, I whipped out a can of brown spray paint we had on hand and gave them a coat.  Well, then we moved and the pictures moved with us. 

See them on the top shelf?

I found two pictures (on of my dad at his first birthday and one of me at my First Communion) that replaced two of the unknown persons, but one remained...until last Tuesday.  That was the day I decided to change them up.

First I decided to lighten them up a little.

 I decided to 'go green' with them using some paint leftover from our guest bathroom.  To go from dark brown to that light green though, I first spray painted them white.

Onto the pictures.  Here's the six strangers that had been.  Anyone recognize them?  We'd love to know their stories.  :)

For now they're being stowed away somewhere in case we need them someday or someone claims them.  :)

Still lacking pictures that would fit into the frames, I decided to morph into an artist for an hour and create my own personal pictures.  I've always wanted to draw/paint some kind of picture that continued through three frames...let me explain.

First I cut three 5 x 7 pieces of card stock out using the covers of some construction paper books we had.  Then, for drawing purposes, I tape them together so that I could get a cohesive picture that could be separated later but still be cohesive in three different frames...make sense?  I decided on a 'bird and branches' theme so first I drew out the main branches and the bird.

Using leftover brown paint from the previous owner, I painted the branches and then went on to paint some leaves.

Using leftover blue paint from our master bedroom (y'all know I'm all about using what you have), I painted our pretty little bird.

After it was dry and my 'masterpiece' was complete, I carefully removed the tape joining the three and put them in their respective frames.

Introducing our new, FREE, artwork made with lots of love and leftovers by me, Bean.

Back into the hutch they go for now but later in life I'm thinking they might grace the walls of a future little girl's room or sun room...we'll see!  Big change though, right?  Anyone else break out their inner artist and create something with leftover paint recently?  My friends Lauren and Jenn did, creating some great modern paintings to flank a fireplace with two large pieces of canvas and leftover master bedroom paint!  It's very therapeutic, costs little to nothing, and looks great!  Anyone else?!  Any other ideas?  I'd love to see them!  Of course now that I've started, you can be sure to see more in the future too!