Halloween Birdhouse Tutorial

So here it is - the tutorial for the Halloween Birdhouse. Think about all the possibilities for these little wooden pieces - you could turn it into a Christmas house or you could make it a shabby chic cottage with lots of flowers! Anything's possible!

Supplies:
1. Wood birdhouse
2. Patterned papers (I used 3 different patterns) die cuts and stamps - I used the My Mind' Eye Blackbird collection
3. Two inch circle punch
4. Tracing Paper
5. Black acrylic paint (not pictured)
6. Mod Podge (I used matte)
7. If you are stamping - stamp block, distress inks, archival ink, watercolor brushes
8. Nonstick Craft Mat - because EVERYONE should have one of these!
Paint the edges the birdhouse with black paint (you only need to paint the parts that will show) Unfortunately I didn't have black paint (who doesn't have black paint??) So instead of driving the half mile to the local craft store I decided to paint it with black soot distress reinker. Which totally worked - until I wanted it to be dry - and it wasn't drying - but I had this brilliant idea to seal it with mod podge and hoped that would make it so I could handle it - and it totally worked! But it would have been SOOO much easier with acrylic paint!
2 Use tracing paper to trace the sides of the birdhouse. Use the patterns to trace and cut out your sides from patterned paper (i picked different patterns for the top, sides, and back and front) And I totally learned to use tracing paper from Melissa Samuels - genius!
Use mod podge to adhere your pieces to the birdhouse ( I apply the mod podge to the wood)
Sand down the corners to make sure the papers are flush with the sides of the house. You could ink the sides at this point (I planned on it... but I forgot...oops!)
Apply mod podge to the outside of the birdhouse to seal it - it also gives a really cool texture.
Now comes the embellishing! Instead of cutting the birdhouse hole out of the paper I punched a 2" circle out of black cardstock and glued it to the front - made my life SO much easier! (helpful tip - when using punches flip the punch over (like pictured) so you can see where you are punching - much more relevant when punching patterned papers)
I used the coordinating stamp set and stamped a punch of tree images. I then used my distress inks to watercolor them. To do this I picked a couple colors I liked (spiced marmalade and peeled paint) and wiped the ink pad on the craft mat. Then taking watercolor paint brushes (they have water in them - when you squeeze them the water comes out) I added a little bit of water and painted the ink on. When I was done I cut the images out. (tip - I use ranger archival ink to stamp the image - it's waterproof so it won't bleed when you paint the distress ink on - staz on would have worked as well but I LOVE archival ink)
I embellished the rest of the house by cutting images out of the patterned paper and adhering to the house. To get the trees in the front yard to stand up I left an extra piece at the bottom to fold over so it would stand up.

Well there it is! I hope you enjoyed and if you decide to make one send me a picture, I'd love to see! And who knows.. it might end up on the blog!

This post is linked at Polly Want a Crafter? and Blue Cricket Design and: