Shiny Tiny Rhiny

Weird title, I know, but hang in there with me and you will understand where it’s coming from :)

I had a great weekend. Jason had Thursday through Monday off and I had Saturday off (Saturday is the only day I work) and so we enjoyed it! Yesterday we had a wonderful day with friends and family and it was good to have some much needed time off. Especially for Jason. I wasn’t ready for him to go back to work today. Plus, that meant that I had to get back to work here at home to. And believe me, I have been working. This is what I have been working on for the past week and a half:

All of our windows from the outside look terrible. Really terrible. The one shown above isn’t even the worst one. And, maybe I shouldn’t admit this, but they have looked bad since we moved in 6 years ago. This year, I finally had enough and decided to start tackling this project. I knew it would be a big job, and it is. I have been scraping and scraping. But I’m hoping to get the bottom back windows done before the weather turns really hot and the humidity sets in because they are the worst. That’s my goal :) Thankfully, now I am armed with a heat gun and it is going much faster! I have to scrape all the windows down, including the glazing, clean them, re-glaze them, primer them, and then paint. I’m still on the scraping part. It could be a while. I have 5 scraped and 15 left (but only 3 more to reach my goal of the back bottom windows) See why I’ve been putting it off for so long?! Yikes!

Anyway, just thought I would fill you in on what I’m up to. Now on to something more exciting: Shiny Tiny Rhinies…

I’ve been wanting a rhino for my wall. Especially the rhino from West Elm. I think they are so cute and when I visited a West Elm earlier in the month I got to see them in person and then I really wanted one. But, the price tag stopped me in my tracks. $99-$199 was not in my wallet at the time and so I got to thinking… Can I? Is it possible to DIY one of these guys? Yes, I think I can :)

I started thinking of how this might work and I was fully expecting this to be a project that went straight into the garbage in failure but surprisingly, it worked. The funny thing is, I had pinned a couple of different photos of DIY animal heads (here and here) but I hadn’t even looked at their tutorials. But it must have sparked a thought that it could be done. Later, I looked up the other tutorials and it ended up that I pretty much did the same thing as this one without even realizing it. And here I thought I was being so clever :)

First, I crumbled up a bunch of paper and sort of molded into the shape I wanted. Using duct tape, I secured it together.

I know, it doesn’t really look like a rhino yet, does it?!

After all of my paper was in place, I duct taped the whole thing so it was nice and secure.

Hmmm… starting to look better. Since this project took me several days, Jason would check in on me and ask me how my tiny rhiny project was going. And that is how it got the name Tiny Rhiny.

After Tiny Rhiny was all taped up, I used Mod Podge and more strips of the white paper to cover it like paper mache.

I did many layers and had to wait for it to dry each time which is why it took me several days.

After several layers I decided it was time for paint. I brushed on several coats of paint and then I also spray painted several coats with a gloss paint. That was how it became Shiny Tiny Rhiny.

And then, after all that work, I hung him up in Jason’s office.

He is on the wall kind of by the couch and when Jason is sitting on the couch he faces the rhino because he likes to sit sideways with his feet up.

The other day I walked down there when Jason was in the room and he said, “hey, there’s a shiny tiny rhiny in my office.” Ya, we’re dorks like that :)

I had so much fun making it and I was so surprised that it turned out so well, now I am wanting to make more. Although, I admit, there are only so many animals I need on my walls. If I think of another spot to put one, I might end up making another. A different animal though. West Elm has a really cute hippo that I like too :)

Or maybe instead of just the head I could try a whole animal. That would be crazy. I just might do it :)

One of my favorite things is how the white looks against the dark wall. Which is why I chose to hang it in this room. It looked way too cool to put him anywhere else :)

And that’s the story of our Shiny Tiny Rhiny. What do you think?!