Using Burlap for Crafting

I love the look of burlap but I'll be honest, I'm not crazy about the mess it makes when you work with it.  It leaves little fibers, fuzz and strings all over everything.  Yuck.  But the texture is so cool, isn't it?   Last week I showed you the Ho, ho, ho Christmas Card Holder I made.   Today I'm going to share the picture frame I made as a gift for my good friend Moira.

You know Moi - I went down to Sanibel last August with her and Traci.  You can read about our fun filled trip here.   Moira and I share a passion for decorating with beach themed items, and after she gave me some gorgeous sand dollars a couple of weeks ago, I had an idea of something I wanted to make for her.

First I took an 8" x 10" picture frame and painted it beige....

 I applied a thin coat of watered down Elmer's Glue to both sides of the sand dollars to help make them a little more sturdy.  Sand dollars are so fragile and I've found that I break fewer of them if I coat them with the glue mixture.  Once they dry, you can't even tell.   I took a piece of burlap and cut a piece a little larger than the cardboard insert for the frame.  Then I ironed it out nice and flat.   I pulled out my stencils and some blue paint....

....and stenciled one of our favorite sayings onto the burlap....

Once the paint had dried I attached the burlap to the cardboard insert and put it inside the frame.  Finally I took one of the sand dollars and glued it to the corner of the frame.  I adore the look of stenciled letters on burlap.

So the above frame was made for Moira and then I made this for myself.  I took one of the arrowhead sand dollars she gave me and gave it the Elmer's Glue dip.  Then I took a 4" x 4" frame, painted it beige and simply glued the sand dollar to the back of the frame.   This was a super easy project and it's now standing on a book shelf  in my office.  Isn't the shape of this sand dollar awesome?

I swear it took me longer to clean up all that burlap than it did to make both projects.

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