5 Valentine Crafts Using DollarTree and Thrifted Items / Turn a DollarTree Sign into High End Decor

Hello Crafty Tribe, this is Maddie, and let's get creative. So these are the projects that I'm working on during my filming. So you'll get to see all of those. I started with that red love sign from Dollar Tree. And I just traced out all the letters just onto some regular paper. It was pretty easy to see them with the contrast between the red and the white. And then I just have some crafting foam. I'm just telling you I got a great deal on a big bundle of it at the thrift store. So I'm pretty excited about that. And I'm just going to use some white craft foam and trace out those letters onto it. So I started with some chalk pastel and I thought I could just transfer them onto the foam. I didn't want to use a marker or a transfer paper because I was scared it would smudge on the foam. But this chalk pastel didn't quite work, it wasn't quite clear enough to see. So then I decided to just roll up some tape, kind of use it as double-sided tape, and stick the pattern down to the foam so that I could cut it out that way. And that seemed to work fairly easily. It worked fairly well. So I just took my time and tried to cut them out really nicely. I did try and make them just a couple millimeters bigger than what was on the sign just to be sure that they covered up the white letters that were already there. And then I just laid them all out and stuck them down with some double-sided tape. And that chalk pastel just wiped right off of them just with a baby wipe. And then I picked out four patterns, just kind of some random hearts and pink ones from some scrapbook pads that I have. And just kind of laying them out, deciding which patterns to use on which letter. And then I cut them out just a little bit smaller than the white letters. So not quite a quarter inch less than the foam. And then I just stuck all those down with double-sided tape as well. And you can see by that part I just used a skewer, like a little barbecue skewer, and I made the front of the arrow and the back of the arrow. For the back, the feathers, I just used a little piece of tinfoil. And then for the little part at the front, it's just a piece of pink foam. And then just gluing down the galvanized part that was there originally. So just gluing that back on. And then I just had some of these offcuts from Home Depot that they actually just throw away. So always when you're at Home Depot or Lowe's or whatever, just have a look in their scrap bin what they're getting rid of, because you never know what you'll find. And I just painted them white. I think I gave them two coats of top paint just to make sure they were covered really well. And then I'm just showing you, I just wanted to make this look like more of a luxe kind of home decor item. So those boards are often bowed, those little signs. So I'm just taking another one. I got a bunch of those long signs after Christmas for halftime. And then I put the two bowed sides opposite each other. And I put a bunch of wood glue in between. And then I put them underneath two big piles of books for the night. And then just left it. And in the morning they were glued together really well. And they're so solid and there's no warp to them at all. And I was super happy about that. I can see me doing that in the future again. It just makes a dollar tree sign look so high end and so much better. So I'm really pleased with how this turned out. And I hope you guys like it too. Hopefully it inspires you to maybe do something like that with those signs. Because I really like the design of it. I didn't really feel like I needed to paint it. So here I'm just working on a little mailbox. A little Valentine mailbox. So I found the mailbox after Christmas for 75% off. And then that's just like kind of a 70s candle holder sort of thing. So I just poked a little hole with a nail in the mailbox. And then that candle holder already has kind of a nail sticking out of it. So I'm just going to use that to attach it with. So I just gave the wooden candle holder kind of a rough coat of white. Just letting some of that wood soak through. And I just worked in kind of one direction mostly. Just letting some of the brown soak through. So then this was a new find for me at our dollar store, Dollarama. They're selling these kind of mini vinyl sticker sheets. And they had them in this wood grain texture pattern. Which I was really excited about. I thought it was cute. So just lining them up to go over top of the mailbox. Making sure that the lines, the pattern lines up. I just thought it was a really cute pattern and that I would just cover most of the mailbox with it. Just to give it some more interest. And it went on really well. It might be sticky so hopefully I'll be able to use that for lots of projects in the future. It did tear a little bit there but it was easy to fix. And I'm just using those foam parts as a pattern. I just cut out some more of that vinyl. The pink wood grain vinyl. Just to fit inside the foam like that purple part. So the vinyl is actually pretty sticky so I just used that. And then just used some double sided tape on the foam. And stuck one on the front of the mailbox and one on the back. Kind of reminded me of a sneaky Charlie Brown mailbox. I don't know why. So I just put a little foam part on the flag. And then I just dry brushed a little bit of pink over top of the white on the post for the mailbox. Just to give it some interest. And I also sanded it a little bit to distress it. And this is the sandpaper from Dollar Tree which I was so excited to find. And now I'm so disappointed because it's just disintegrating in my hand. Does anyone else have that issue? Is it just me? I don't know if you have to just keep it flat and not work on anything angled with it. But it basically just fell apart in my hand. So this is my little Charlie Brown sneaky mailbox. And then for the next project I was so in love with this reusable bag that I found at Dollar Tree over Christmas. And I actually went back to the store again like a week later and they still had them which I couldn't believe. So I picked up another one with this in mind. So I had this on display at Christmas. It just has a wicker basket inside so you can keep it dirty so it looks filled like that. And then I had that foam part package that I got last year on clearance at Michaels. And then this is so funny. This cardboard print was on an instant potato package. And it just caught my eye and I thought that matches what I'm doing. So I cut out some parts out of that as well. And then just kind of worked them all together to make this kind of a nice little load of parts for this truck. And then just to give it kind of that watercolor feel like the truck on the bag has, I just kind of used a darker shade on each color part and gave it kind of a watercolor feel. Just like a messy little watercolor texture to that. So just like a pretty dark purple on the dark purple ones. And then a lighter purple for those. Again, not going for perfection. Just a quick little watercolor texture over them. It was not hard to do. Do not be intimidated by this. So I just tried to kind of go one shade up from the color it already was. But this is one of the cutest designs that I've seen at Dollar Tree. I wish they would have done more of it. Maybe next year hopefully. So then once they were all dried, I just stuck them out into a pattern again. So just trying to alternate so that there wasn't a light pink aside a light pink. It's not perfect, but I just kind of made sure that there was enough interest to it. And then I just went in and tacked them down with a hot glue gun. So I didn't want this to be permanently on the bag. So I figured I would just make it a separate addition that I could just use after cooking on the bag. Because I think I'll do the same thing with the bag next year. I really thought it was so cute. I had it sitting on my front step with a really big red bow on top. So I just used some cardboard to make it sturdy. And then I gave it a clear coat just with a matte finish clear spray. Just so that that watercolor would stay on there. Or the watercolor effect. I guess it's the color effect. Now I'm just making up some snow paint. So I've done this in previous videos. So just some white acrylic paint. A little bit of glue to bind it with. Some shaving cream. Some baking soda. And a little bit of flour. And it just gives this nice fluffy snow texture to the paint. I think I just showed you here in a second how fluffy it is. You can see on the end of the paint strip. So then just like the painting of the truck on the bag. There was a bunch of snow sitting on top of the tree as well. So I thought I would just paint some snow to sit on top of the heart. And just keep that same cute feature to these as well. So I just kind of think like snow. And kind of have it the way it's resting on the truck. And where the snow would fall and where the snow would settle on the heart. And then it just took a couple hours to dry. So then I gave that another coat of the matte spray sealer. Just to make sure that the foam would seal. And then painted a little bit of blue shadow. Like kind of a low light on the snow. Just like the inspiration on the bag has. So just kind of emulate that look. So just mixing a little bit of that medium kind of periwinkle blue with the light sky blue. And then just trying to go on the underside of the little snow piece on the heart. So again just super easy and not going for perfection. If you look at the truck on the bag it's not perfection either. Just to kind of give it that effect. So I keep saying watercolor effect. But it is just acrylic paint. So then I just decided to use some duct tape. And use it kind of as a double sided tape to stick this to the bag. Because I was going to keep this one inside for Valentine's Day. So it was outside on my set for Christmas. And then I just have this just inside my door on top of a shoe shelf. So I thought it was super cute and I get to enjoy that scent for another extra couple weeks. Which is nice. So the next project is just one of these marquee heart lights from Michaels. I got it on clearance. I think I got it like 80 or 90% off last year. I actually got two of them. So I thought I would just kind of lighten it up and kind of make it a little bit funner and happier. So I started with a white coat of top paint just to lighten it. Because I knew I wanted to go in with this light pink. And it just makes that much easier to do. So I just coated the whole thing in pink. And then a nice fun blue for the feather design on the end. And this is called Gun Metal Gray I believe by FolkArt. Which is kind of a nice dark silver color. And then I went in with a stylus from Dollar Tree just with the larger ball end. And just did some polka dots all over the piece. So I'm just using white, linen white top paint. And just doing kind of a random polka dot pattern all over. I just thought it gave it a little cuteness. And a cute pattern. Then I went in with some darker blue. Just to kind of bring out some of the detail in that ribbed feather design on the end. So I just wiped most of it off. Just leaving it kind of where it settles in between a little bit. And it just kind of rippens the color. So then with these are the peonies from Dollar Tree. And same thing, I just wanted to give them a little bit more richness of color. So I just watered down some of that darker blue. And I just painted it down into the bottom of the petal. Just to kind of give it that deeper color on the inside of the flower. And then it's still light on the edges. And then that just took an hour or two I think to dry. So I just painted on fleas and flowers and peonies. So I just lightened up the leaves with a little bit of a lighter green color. And just thought this added some more cuteness and interest to it as well. And just a quick before and after. And there it is hanging on the wall. So I just used one of the little Dollar Tree bow command book sort of things. I think it was a two pound one. It seemed just fine. It held it up just fine. So here I'm just kind of Valentine-ing up one of the little gnomes from Dollar Tree. So I just freshened up his teeth with pink hat, purple shirt, and I left his little tongue red. And the eyes don't have any white in them. So I just painted the whole eye white and then went back in with a little bit of the skin color that they had used. And then just, you know, the blue irises and the black pupils. And I'm just showing you this little detail brush that I have here. And I'm just using some darker purple to go into the folds of the fabric just to give it a little bit more detail. Again, it doesn't have to be perfect. You just kind of water down a deeper color and let it fall into those little grooves of the fabric, the little folds. And then I tried to give him some little highlights on his eyes just where the light would bounce off. So again, it's not perfect, but it's better than you get them. Better than the way they're painted at Dollar Tree. So then I used some gloss mod podge for his eyes and then just some matte on the rest of them. And I thought he just turned out kind of cute and goes well with everything for Valentine. And then I just, I love this sign just as is. This is from Dollar Tree as well. But I thought I would just kind of add a little bit of shadow because you'll be able to see the top and sides of it. So just again with the dark blue, just watered it down a little bit and painted a little bit of a shadow detail to it. And then I think I just padded it off with some gloss. Yeah, just kind of blending it in. And then this is just going to be the final little piece that I used for the vignette that I was just showing you. And I got it for $1.50. And on the bottom of that little flower pot, there's a sticker that says $44. I think somebody paid $44 for that. So this is the little vignette as he walked in the door. And it brought me a lot of happiness. So hopefully it brings you some inspiration too. And if you like what you see, I'm going to be putting up a Valentine's geared tray video soon as well. So make sure you subscribe and set up your notifications for that. And thank you guys so much for watching. Talk to you soon.