Ohhh DEAR me you are not going to want to miss Lucy from Craftberry Bush's guest project today!!!

Alright friends----I have SUCH a great treat for you today----you get to meet my wonderful friend Lucy from Craftberry Bush!!  She is AMAZING.  My wish is that you will all go and get to know her because I literally am inspired by every single one of her ideas on her blog!  More importantly Lucy is a wonderfully kind and genuine person to get to know.  

So without anymore chatter from me I will hand you over to Lucy-----my co-host for this weeks addition of Crafty Scrappy Happy Me. Thursday.  And pleaseeee get ready to link up starting tonight!!!!

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Happy Wednesday to all!  I am Lucy and I have a little blog called Craftberry Bush.  I like to think of my blog as my happy place; a place where creativity, imagination and inspiration is always blooming.

I am so delighted to be Jaime Lyn's guest and honoured to be this week's linky party co-host!  As you guys already know, Jaime is made of sugar, is super sweet and is one of my favourite people in Blogville. 

Jaime - thank you so much for having me and for always being an inspiration.

When Jaimie initially asked me to guest, I wasn't sure I was feeling the fall decor just yet.  But the labour long weekend always marks the official end of summer and as much as I would love to have an everlasting summer, the cooler weather and the cozy sweaters are starting to look very appealing to me.  So it's time to put away my summer decor and start to cozy up our nest. 

                                                                 

Pottery Barn is always a great place to find inspiration for any holiday and I have been particularly attracted to the resin deer antlers in their fall decor this year.  But as usual, the DIYer in me cannot justify spending $52, so I decided to make my own and share the 'how to' with you.

Materials

y-shaped branch (optional)

Air drying clay or salt flour clay (recipe found here)

Tin foil  

Paint (optional)

I used DecoArt - Antique Gold

                              Antique White

                           Raw Umber 

Let's get started....

1) If you choose to use a branch, find a branch that simulates an antler

2) Sand any knots and with an exacto knife, sharpen the tips of the branch as shown

3) It should look like a sharpened pencil

4) With your clay, cover the entire surface of the branch

5) Using clay, add additional peaks to the existing branches like shown OPTION 2.

6) With tin foil, form the shape of the antler by rolling and scrunching the foil paper. You can make as many peaks as you want.

7) With clay, cover the entire surface of foil (I found the foil paper much easier to cover than the branch).  If you are using self drying clay, dip your fingers in water and run them along the surface to get rid of any bumps and smoothen.  It doesn't have to be perfect as you will sand it once it is dry.

8) Prop against any item so antler dries in desired position. I used smooth rocks to prop it up.

9) While clay is still wet, use toothpick or any other sharp point to make little ridges or indentations.

10) I used a hard bristle paint brush and stippled the 'marrow' at the bottom of the antler.  I also ran it along some of the area to make some areas look porous.

11) Allow clay to dry (note: it may take upwards of 24 hours) and you might have to turn it over to ensure it dries evenly. 

12) Gently sand antler with fine grit sand paper and if desired, paint and gloss.

And that's it!

I wasn't convinced I would keep the antlers white, so I snapped a few pictures prior to painting them.  I find seeing pictures of my crafts helps me to determine what I like better and it also allows me to see more clearly any areas of, shall we say, improvement.
 

See how realistic the marrow looks

by stippling it with a brush?

This is what I mean when I can see 'areas of improvement' .  From the picture, I can see that if I want to keep these white I will have to sand them down a little more and make them smoother.



Can you picture these mounted on a piece of white wood and hanging on the wall. What do you think, do you like them white, or....

Here they are painted.  I applied a coat of the Americana Antique white and allowed it to dry. I then painted it with antique gold and quickly wiped it off so you could see a tint of it.  Lastly, I dry brushed raw umber to ridges and the marrow and rubbed it off with a clean cloth.

In the pictures, the antlers appear to be made out

of wood but are more realistic looking 'in person'. 

Total cost - $3.95, which was the cost of the air drying clay and I only used half of it.  The project overall is fairly easy, as nature is not perfect and the imperfections make it look more realistic. 

So, that's it from me for now.  Thank you so much for spending some of your time with me.  I hope that if you decide to visit my little Craftberry Bush you like what you see and come back to visit me again.

Oh...and  please go ahead and feel free to take a few craftberries with you while you're there.

Have a beautiful day!

much love,

Lucy

While fooling around with my antlers, my son took this picture with the iPhone.

Not the most flattering picture, but just had to share...:)