Run and Frost

A little while back I decided I needed to re-vamp certain aspects of my living room, and the easiest part was the TV console.  I had pictures and a candle votive on it, but it just looked cluttered.  I went searching and found this cool idea of candles in really big hurrican vases.  I knew the table would look to empty with just the vases so I decided to make another table runner.  You remember the other post Run Away With Me and I made a runner with pointed ends, well I decided I wanted something more simple so I just did square ends this time.  I also didnt want to do tassles because that just really didnt mesh with the living room but I did find some great brown ribbon and thought it would look great as a timm for the whole runner.  Once I had that I was on the hunt for a large hurricane vase, candles and coffee beans for the filler.  BE WARNED...those hurricane vases are soooo hard to find!  I went to Pier 1 (and by the way they have the PERFECT vase, but they arent for sale, go figure), The Container Store, another Pier 1 and finally Marhsalls as a last resort.  Surprise upon surprise Marshalls was where I found the vases.  Now an important note on that is this was a Marshalls Home Goods store so they had a really great glass selections which I dont think all Marshall stores have.  I also got my candles there for a great price and was on to whole coffee bean.  Who knew coffee beans were so expensive!  I dont drink coffee so I have no concept of how much it costs but 2 small bags for $9 seems expensive for a vase filler, but maybe Im just being silly.  Once I had all my items it was assembly time!  Check out the below and leave comments if you think I could do something to spice it up even more!!  Oh and the "Dream" metal art came from Garden Ridge for $5, what a great find!

You can see the detail of the ribbon and fabric better here.

I saw somewhere that it is relitively easy to etch glass so I thought that would be a great little addition to the vases you see above.  ANOTHER BE WARNED!  Glass etching yes is easy, but if you dont SLATHER the solution onto your pattern it wont turn out at all.  I had to do one vase 3 times, and consequently have one side of the vase that is a mess up but you cant really see it because its glass etching and it doesnt show up very well.  Which is also the other be warned, you cant really see the finished product with how I have my vases filled.  Im sure if/when I add more coffee beans you will be able to see the R and J but right now it was a lot of work for not a lot of payoff.  Also we used the armour etch, the bottle says to leave on for 5 minutes but we had to leave it on for 15minutes.  Longer is sometimes better!  Below is a close up of one of the letters, it looks awesome but Im not sure it was worth it.  To get the "R" I had contact paper left over from lining the dresser drawers from my Dresser project that we used to cut the design out on.  What ended up working best was applying the contact paper to the vase first, printing the pattern from the computer, taping it to the contact paper, then we used at exacto knife to cut the design out directly on the glass.  I also think this may have helped with the etching process, but I have no way to be sure.

If you have some great living room ideas post there here so we can see your amazing creations!

Project Housewife Out!