Practicing Thriftcraft, No. 2

Hello All,

I saw this idea on the Internet and it stuck in my head -- you take an old picture you find at a thrift store and alter it to your liking.  Like this from David Irvine:

LOL - that's so great!!  You can see more of his work HERE!  (and if you want to purchase any prints of his work, go HERE).  There is also this article, Adding Monsters to Thrift Store Paintings which features the work of Chris McMahon:

Isn't that so cool!?  Now these guys are artists --I am not!  But, I wanted to try it all the same; especially to create something unique for Halloween.  I kept my eye out for something I thought I could add something to--like a pumpkin in a window of a little house print or a ghost popping out of a barn pic or something--anything I could alter simply :)  Well, I found something I could work with!  Now, this is fudging just a tad because in my excitement to alter the paint, I failed (UGH) to take a "Before" pic so I had to use "PaintNet" to "erase" my sharpie marks.  Here is what the original looked like:

I saw it had water damage but it's an actual painting --woo hoo!  The tree is what caught my eye.  I wanted to fill it with crows!  But then I noticed the lone figure staring off into the sunset (I guess it could be a sunrise??? but for "my" creation, it's a sunset - ha! ha!)  And I thought, with a pointy hat and long dress, it could be a witch!  So here's the painting with my Sharpie alterations:

And then I thought, what witch would be without a black cat?  So I added one :)

I am also quite pleased to have "cleaned" up some of the water damage.  I used Bic Mark Its, a sharpie and Copic markers.  I thought about adding those crows but thought it would be over-doing it a little.

So, now that I have my perfect altered painting, I decorated my mantel:

Here's the breakdown, left to right:

super cool iron candle holder with it's own snuffer - I think it is handmade.  I found it at the Goodwill outlet.

Books - "spell book" from Hallmark a few years ago, Anne Rice's The Witching Hour, and the Witch of Blackbird Pond --a shelf sitter toad, also from the Goodwill outlet (I got it last year); and the small feathered owl came from Michael's this year (40% off).

Next is the ceramic boot I painted last year (THIS POST):

The opalescent green lidded glass dish is by Mosser, it's a reproduction of Heisey Glass pattern, Ipswich (I bought it from ebay) the two decorative bottles came from B-Thrifty (99 cents each), the framed witch silhouette is from last year too.

The small cast iron compote is by the same manufacturer of the dish I found last year (HERE) and the witch hat is from 2010 when I decorated my porch with witchy stuff (HERE) I just changed the bow for this year. The "stand" is a thrifted black wooden candlestick I found at the GW outlet.

And finally, the clock:

It was a thrift find!  The pendulum works but the clock arms don't move so I went ahead and painted it up for Halloween.  I think it needs stripes or a great Halloween saying but I haven't been inspired yet as to what to put on it so it's just green for now :)

I'm linking up!

Elizabeth & Co, Be Inspired Features and Link Party #90

Take care,
Lisa