Happy 4th of July!

I probably should have blogged about this before the 4th of July, but I guess late is better than never. I love to decorate for holidays. I have boxes of decorations for Christmas, Halloween, Valentines and more. My 4th of July box is a little different than the rest. For some reason almost all of my July 4th decorations are hand made. Mostly by me. I'm not sure why that is. I do know that I am kind of picky about my decorations. I won't buy a decoration just because it corresponds with a holiday. I actually will pass by more decorations than I will stop and look at and I buy even fewer. I really love the decorations that I have. Sometimes I will switch out old decorations that I don't love anymore, but I develop an attachment to the handmade and memory decorations. Those I never change. Maybe that is why I love my July 4th decor.

One of my favorites is this red, white and blue swag. I got the idea from pinterest, but then changed it some to use items that I already had around by house.

I cut triangles from burlap. I then painted them red. After they dried I added cream paint polka dots. I used the end of my foam brush handle to put them on.

Burlap isn't easy to paint and sometimes it will curl up some as the paint dries. When they were completely dried, I put the triangles in a stack and put them under a heavy book for a while. How long depends on how curled up they are. Mine weren't bad, so I didn't leave them under the heavy dictionary for more than about 30 minutes. That gave me time to paint some small, wood stars blue. Then I hot glued them onto some natural twine that I had.

The edges are rough and not all of the triangles have a blue star, but I really love how it turned out. 

My daughter painted a flat canvas for this decoration:

She painted the ends red and then taped them off when they were dried. After she painted the blue she pulled the masking tape off and let the board dry. She added the polka dots later using the lid to a powerade bottle to make the circles. This one is a fun decoration. It fits our personalities that are at our house. Plus it gave my daughter a direction for crafting something. 

I have other things that I have made but these two are probably my favorites. These will stay up for the rest of July. We might even add something else to the mix. For now we are enjoying what we have and remembering what July 4th is all about. Our freedom.