What I'm Thankful For...

It's the little things really.

Hope everyone had a very happy Thanksgiving!!!  

Meeting My Match(es)

I've already shared the story of how I came to amass a substantial matchbook collection here.  But I can sum up as well.  It's the same old story of girl meets fire, fire fascinates girl, girl collects matches.  And with all of those matches in my possession, I wanted a way to appropriately display them.

Enter inspiration:

Addicted 2 Decorating

I had the matches, and now the inspiration, but I needed a way from point A to B.  There are shockingly not a lot of matchbook art tutorials out there but I finally found this one on HGTV:

Not having or wanting to use scrap wood, I modified it a bit and here's what I came up with:

How to Make Matchbook Art


Materials
Matchbooks
Blank Stretched Canvas
Black Acrylic Paint
Scissors
Modgepodge
Paintbrush


Directions
1.  Paint canvas black with acrylic paint and allow to dry
2.  Cut matches from all matchbooks to prevent fire hazard (would hate for your newly made art to go up in a blaze of glory).
2.a. If you are anal like me, arrange matchbooks by location of origin.
3.  Use paintbrush to apply modgepodge to painted canvas in small sections.
4.  Press down a few matchbooks a time to modgepodged area.
5.  Repeat steps 3 and 4.  Continue to arrange matchbooks in a mosaic pattern until entire canvas is covered. Some overlap of matchbooks will be necessary.
4.  Brush another layer (or two) of modgepodge over the matchbooks to seal your work of art
5.  Hang and admire

Here is my final product:

As I said, I arranged my matchbooks by origin since I had large concentrations from places I've lived and I thought it would be cool to keep all of those together on the mural.

There's Raleigh in the middle:

Those No Longer With Us:  Rock-ola Cafe, Mr. Dunderbak's, Pat Patterson's Place, Darryl's, Pieworks, Grisanti's; And some old stand-by's: Winston's, Crowley's, 42nd Street Oyster Bar, Greenshield's, Griffin's

Chapel Hill:

Shout-outs to:  Top of the Hill, He's Not, Coffee Shop, Crook's Corner, 411 West, The Rat, Spanky's Yeats, Michael Jordan's 23, Bailey's, Spartacus

Hotlanta:

Emeril's, Vini Vidi Vici, Chops, Inman Park Patio, Food 101, Pool Hall, Roy's Atlanta, Halo, Genki, Taco Stand, Noche, One Midtown Kitchen, Taverna Plaka, Cafe Tu Tu Tango, Eclipse Di Luna, Pappadeaux, Nava

Hilton Head:

Marley's, The Lodge, Crazy Crab, Purple Onion, Juleps, Monkey Business, Harbourside Cafe, Fitzgerald's, Truffles, Aunt Chilada's, Cafe at Wexford, Salty Dog Cafe, Old Oyster Factory, Captain Woody's

And of course Baltimore:

Tio Pepe, RA, Phillips, James Joyce, Squires (like I said, that pesky smoking ban really slowed down my matchbook collecting)

I love this display because each matchbook brings back great memories of places I've been and the people I spent time with there and it gives me a way to see them all at once, which just wasn't happening with them all stacked up in a box or even in a glass vase.  Plus our wall was hurtin' for some art.  Mission accomplished, game, set, match(es).

Getting My Link On:

Tutorial Tuesday, Sassy Sites, DIY Showoff, My Repurposed Life, Strut Your Stuff Saturday, Overflowing With Creativity, Tuesday's Treasures, Addicts Not So Anonymous, Tip Junkie