Lately I've been tackling a few projects in my Living Room. There actually wasn't much to finish in here. I've sewn curtains, and the only thing I still need to do is upholster some chairs. I have never attempted such a thing before though. However, a couple of months ago I took to watching Ellen's Design Challenge. It was actually pretty safe for me. Well, up until they started making couches. All of a sudden, I feel like I can make a couch now too. It really didn't look that hard...in theory. I totally think I could pull it off, and if I can make a couch...then how hard could it be to recover chairs? What do you think? Piece of cake?
I probably shouldn't have started with that because what I actually did might be a let down. It was definitely more fun though. For this project I made coasters. My original plan was to design a piece of art, and split it into 4 pieces. Then I started looking into it, and came up with an even better idea. Pictures of me! I mean who doesn't want to look at my beautiful face while they partake in libations. So here we go. I chose the 4 pictures below.
Now I didn't just select pictures at random. I went through several pictures of myself, and several effects in Photoshop. After some trial and error and some direction, I came up with a theme and style that I liked. I put the 4 photos into Photoshop and played around with each of them. When all was said and done, I came up with the 4 images below.
Fancy huh?! I wanted the images to complement each other style wise, but have some color variation between them. When I was happy, I printed the 4 images out.
Once I had the images it was time to actually make the coasters. I bought 4 inch tiles from Home Depot. Tile is actually pretty inexpensive. The regular ones are only 18 cents. I wanted nice edges on mine, so I decided to splurge for the fancy glass ones at $2.99 a piece. Total budget buster, I know.
To keep them from scratching the surface I added felt to the bottom. I flipped each tile over, and used E6000 to glue the felt to the underside.
Once the felt dried I added the pictures. I cut out each picture, and then used Mod Podge to adhere the picture to the surface.
I spread a thin layer to the back side,
then placed the picture down, pressing firmly.
I repeated the same process for the other 3 coasters. I let all of the coasters set for about an hour before brushing them with two additional layers of Mod Podge to seal in the design, and give them protection from wet beverages.
What do you think? Which one is your favorite? I'm having a hard time picking. I think it depends on the day.
I'm quite excited about the way they turned out. At one point it wasn't coming together, and I was going to just scrap the whole idea. Glad I kept playing around. Now to actually test them out. The most authentic way I could think of was non other than to make myself a Margarita.
I'm glad to say it passed the test. It's nice to have one more project off the list. Just in time too, considering that the weather is starting to get warmer. That means lots of patio situations. If anyone has a good Sangria recipe...pass it on. Until then...It's on to the next project.
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