Sea Shell Checkboard

 A lot of beach vacations end with a bag of shells for me.  I recently brought a bunch of beach themed crafts to GMT.  This is one of them...it's super simple, but a fun way to use some of those shells.

I bought a 1 1/2 foot board and had the home improvement store cut it down to squares.  I painted it white and then I took a regular kitchen sponge and figured out what size square would be the right one for 8x8.  In this case, it ended up being about 1 1/2 inch.  I took some blue paint and sponge pressed it down.  I liked the 'holes' left from the sponge stamp, but you can go back and paint it to be a solid square.  Afterwards I added two different kinds of shells I have.  You could also just paint the same shell two different colors.....or use bottle caps or sea glass....whatever is around.

Sea Shell Tea Lights

 Tomorrow (I think), Good Morning Texas will be airing a segment I pre-recorded a few weeks ago.  The theme was sea shells.  This is one of the crafts I'll be bringing-tea light sea shells.  I'm bringing quite a few crafts.  I'll post a link to the segment on facebook once it airs, but in the meantime....here's a sneak peak.

 I found the original idea for these via a photo from youtube.  I'm not sure of the exact step by steps there, I went off the clip photo, but I imagine it's similar.  I wanted to keep the wick from being blackened, so I put a tea light on a candle warmer (or coffee cupwarmer-whatever you call it).

 I took tweezers and pulled the wick out and placed it in the bottom of the shell.

I then took the tweezers and lifted the tea light (it was too hot to hold) and tipped it over into the shell.  It hardened and now I can burn it like a candle.  I'm going to put these outside this summer in some sand and flower pots.  The great thing is I can refill my shells as many times as I want.  Fun and functional.  It doesn't get a lot easier than this!

Good Morning, Texas: Sea Shell Crafts

 Summer is here.  Shells, seasides, and souvenirs.  I was tasked with bringing some more sea shell themed crafts to the show.  This is a series of crafts I did last year in celebration of one of my favorite places and the memories I took home with me.  I'll be sharing four more crafts today.  I'm blogging about a few, and I'll post the video with the rest on facebook account later.  One idea is to create one of these family initial letters.  It would be a fun memory from a honeymoon beach walk, or a family vacation.
I bought a large chipboard letter at Hobby Lobby, and painted it a color that went with my room (b/c you can see a bit of the board underneath, you could also cover it with sand first).

 Then it was a simple matter of gluing shells on with a hot glue gun.

 I also took some baby food jars and made memory jars.  I went to Maine a few years ago and gathered some sea glass, sea shells and sand from Galveston, and a bracelet made by natives in Brazil and some pieces of broken brick I found around a church (our group had helped raise funds to build the church, and these were used in the construction).  Easy and cheap.  Instead of spraying the lids, I used this mod podge technique I use a lot to make decorative jars.

 Last up...shell game pieces.  I painted a paper mache box, and the pieces can be stored inside.  In this case I used two different types of shells, but you could also paint the shells two different colors.

Summer Sea Shell Crafts

I'm headed to Good Morning Texas today to share Sea Shell crafts.  Conveniently, the beach just happens to be a place I love.  Any beach.  Any time.  Unfortunately, I wasn't able to run to the beach to collect more material for my crafts, but....it just so happens I have a little collection to work with to make these crafts.  The first craft is so easy-take sea shells and add a little bling (and elegance?)-silver/gold, pink...whatever your preference.  Here is the tutorial for this craft.  Including the two step process to making jewelry.  How fun to wear your vacation.  

 Another idea-if you are a minimalist and don't necessarily want round little shells hanging around, why not use the shell to imprint a napkin or stationary?  Here is the tutorial for using any paint and turning it into something that's washable and usable on any summer table setting.

 Last up, these little pottery jars.  I have a tutorial for turning any ceramic pot into this white washed/age look, then add shells and you can bring the shoreline to your garden.  Here are the steps for that tutorial.

Last up....fill an ornament, add a location tag, and add it to your Christmas collection of memories.

I'll be adding the link to today's segment to my facebook page....where most of the segments I've been a part of the last two years (yikes-two years, and more than 50 segments!) live.  Someday I'm going to blog all about the whole GMT experience!  I just need to bring my camera to capture some of the scenes behind the set...maybe I will today!

Sea Shell Garden Pot

 OK, it's not exactly beach from property, but close.  Here's another sea shell idea for those souvenir shells.
First, I took a regular (old) pottery pot, but I wanted it to have that aged look, so I put a little bit of white paint and a lot of water and brushed it on the pot.  My brush was really wet.  I just wanted a streaky glaze.

 Once it dries, you can sand it down a bit, but I found mine worked out pretty well as is.  I then just grabbed a hot glue gun and some shells that were relatively the same size. I glued them down, then took a bunch of smaller shells and glued them in the open spaces.