Housewarming Herbs

I found this box at a garage sale, it had probably been used as a gift set for wine. Even though it had a strange purplish stain on it and was missing it's lid, I was looking forward to transforming it!

Some friends of mine had just moved into a new place and I wanted to give them a housewarming gift. I love having fresh herbs in my kitchen to cook with and I thought they would as well.

My local farmer's market had just started selling herbs for the season, I chose basil, thyme, parsley and oregano. Luckily the little square pots they came in fit perfectly side by side!

The box was made of a soft wood that I wanted to try my hand at carving. I printed out and transferred the letters onto the box with carbon paper. I got out my tools from a printmaking class I had taken years ago and after outlining the design with an exacto knife I started carving out around the letters. At first I wasn't sure how it would turn out but after completing one letter I could see it was going to look great.

When all the carving was done, I painted the whole box a soft black. Next with light grey paint I used a dry brush technique to bring out the raised areas and give it the aged look I was going for.

Fantastic Frames

This is my living room before I got my new couch and redecorated. I had this beige leather one for a few years that was passed down to me. I took it because I needed a couch, it was in good shape, a neutral color...but I never really liked it! Since I didn't like the couch much I never really hung anything above it because it felt kind of temporary.

When I finally bought my new couch this is when I began to decorate and create the kind of living room I had always wanted.

I had been collecting old frames for several years, some weren't that old but some belonged to my great-grandfather in Scotland. I was never really sure what to do with them or what kind of photos or images would do them justice. I decided to hang the frames empty, after all they did feel like works of art.

From this close-up, you can see how all of the frames have a gold undertone but are very different in shape, size and detail from one and other.

This is one of my favorite "works of art" in my home.