Old wood=New frame

Most people that know me know that I love to build, create, redo, and design things. My husband and I regularly take on projects for the house...sometimes to his dismay :) Ha, but I can blame my dad for this obsession of mine because he would frequently take on many projects like this out of interest and frugality while I was growing up.

This summer our family was able to go to Savannah, GA and spend a lot of the time on Tybee Island. My husband was there for a week long workshop at the Savannah College of Art and Design and we were just along for the ride! (I was not keen on the idea of going crazy by myself at home with two wild little boys)

When wandering through one of the markets one day we stumbled across a photographer who had MANY different photographs of abstract letters he had taken on the coast and their cities. We decided to purchase the letters to spell our last name for a souvenir of our trip (my husband condoned it because it was artsy and from places on the coast). The photographer had a great booth and matted and framed the letters for you. BUT here was our dilemma....It would be $15 a letter to mat and frame the word...yeah that would have been $90! Being the thrifty shopper that I am, that was not going to fly with me, so we asked him how much it would be to just get the letters matted...$5 a letter. MUCH better! AND I just so happened to volunteer my husband to make a frame for it. I just figured he was SO talented, he could handle it :) He rolled his eyes.

I wanted to use aged wood for the frame, so my husband kept his eye out. One day while he was driving he spotted an old wooden fence gate that someone was throwing out, so he decided to recycle it (such a good conservationist). Best part, FREE! His finished frame looked like this:

And, no, no he wasn't happy about me making him take this picture...but I was so pleased with what he did!

We contacted a glass company here in town to see if they could cut a piece of glass for us to fit the frame and they only charged $13! Yes please!

After putting it up on the wall where we wanted it we realized the wood was too light to fit with the rest of the dark woods we have so I decided to stain it.

My tools: 1" dry brush and stains, Dark Walnut and Gunstock

I decided to dry brush the stain on in order to give it a more inconsistent look to go with the old weathered wood look. I first brushed on the Gunstock as light as I could and then went over it in random areas with the dark walnut. Note: I tested this out on a scrap piece of wood first. I was pretty happy with how it turned out.

It now blends in better with the wood in our living room! And, please, I just have to note that the total cost for the frame was $13!! We saved $50 :) I LOVE saving money! And recycling of course....