mod-podgery and such

It all started with a Sunday painting project.
Kort and I decided to paint our very own tag-team mural.
{Woot woot!}
It was wonderful.

We sat, and painted, and talked, sweating it out in our Sunday best in the 95 degree shade of the back porch's old tin roof. Then, I realized it wasn't a super-great idea to have a 7 year old paint a mural in his Sunday best, so I made Kort strip down to his undershirt...

And then I decided it would be even better for him to take that off and go change into some old shorts. Now I didn't have to worry about how crazy he got with the paint. Ahhh, very nice.

We painted a tree. 

I loved the look of it. 

Then, I decided that I really wanted it to have texture, so I had the hubs fish a financial planning book printed in the late 80's out of our 3,000 volume collection in the garage. {Our garage is currently a hoarder's dream come true...I'll tell you what...I'm not ambitious enough to think about tackling that one just yet.}

I ripped the book to shreds and started mod podging a black and white newspaper sky onto our masterpiece.

And that really got the wheels turning...

We worked on it for about three hours. 

Then we had to stop because I needed more supplies to continue. So, Monday afternoon, I went to the craft store and bought a bunch of patterned paper and another bottle of Mod Podge cause I was a-burnin' right through it! {Our mural is huge.}

I mod podged a funky black and white tree trunk, and then started cutting out all different sizes of leaves in all of the different patterned papers. Then I glued them in layers on top of one another.

I did a lot of them.
It sort of took hours.

And this is what it looks like.

We hung it in the dining room and I love seeing it during breakfast, lunch and dinner. It makes me smile. Trees are symbolic and lovely for so many different reasons. Tree of life. Family Trees. Growing deep and lasting roots. Reaching for the heavens. Bending to life's breezes. Rebirth each spring. Beauty. Tranquility. Shelter... just all sorts of good things that I want my home to represent.

{BELOW: This is a shot of the dining room. It's all decorated for Tennyson's Birthday party and in this particular shot, the table is all laid out for a double baby shower I hosted for two sweet neighbors and dear friends of mine - that has a post of it's own though.}

This Project:

Huge chunk of wood: free {from a garbage pile}
Mod Podge: $6 {used 50% coupon}
Book Paper: free {cause I'm a hoarder of sorts...}
Scrapbook Paper: $12
Brackets for hanging: $6

*If you liked this project, please re-tweet it, fb it, blog about it...you know, spread the gospel of mod-podgery and joy around a bit!