Here's a fun, fast one my houseguest and I did this summer. A friend saw, somewhere on the internet, a Ouija board table, and said she had to have it. I think she saw it here: http://hellinahandbag.net/. This place is pretty awesome, and I would have ordered the badass glow in the dark table for my friend, but they're custom-made and wouldn't have arrived in time for her birthday. So Stacey and I decided to try it ourselves. I'm, in no way, trying to take away from hellinahandbag's business. In fact, I encourage you to peruse the site and purchase something, particularly the "kitschy Ms. Tissue Head" because it's so awesome. I have no idea if hellinahandbag's table is the one Darcy saw on the internet that night, when I googled, I found quite a few, so I don't think we stole a copyrighted idea. We were in a time crunch, and besides, we needed to make the table a little more "Darcy-like", and I thought, "Ouija board table Huh. I think I could do that."
Darcy's a hard person to buy for, because her gifts are always so thoughful and different, so she raises the bar. She's also a fun person to buy for, because she's quirky and fun, with all kinds of interests. So a plain, black, tasteful Ouija board table woudn't do. (And I think I'm the first person to ever put those words together: "tasteful Ouija board table.") The hardest part of this entire project was finding a Ouija board in two days' time. I thought I had one, but I must have sold it in a garage sale, which is bound to have some negative effect on the ju-ju in my house, but whatever. I ended up having to steal Darcy's from her by calling her husband and having him surreptitiously remove it from their house and have my husband meet her husband in a parking garage (okay, technically their carport) for a Deep Throat-style exchange. For the table, we used my printer table, which was bought, unfinished, at Lowe's in 2000, for $25, I think. It had fourteen layers of paint on it, from it's various incarnations as an end table in every room of my house, through twelve different color schemes. Doesn't matter, it was going to be covered anyway. Darcy decoupaged her dining room table with vintage recipes and food-related photos, so I took her idea and ran with it.
I google-imaged tarot cards and various other occult-related items, printed them out on standard paper, and cut them out. I found awesome, ancient Magic 8 Ball ads, Kreskin kit ads, etc. We the began to decoupage the legs and outer edge of the top of the table with Mod Podge. If you've never decoupaged before (I don't think I have, at least not since kindergarten), you basically brush glue on the back of the paper, stick it to the surface, then brush more glue on top, completely covering it. Make sure the ink on your printed images is completely dry before you brush the glue on, or it will smear. When we ran out of images, we printed more, and even stuck a few playing cards on there. I believe we secured the Ouija board to the table with hot glue. Then came the fun part.
Since the Ouija board is some sort of unholy cross between the occult and a children's toy, our decoupage reflected that. Since we used tarot images and other occult-related things on the paper, we decided to use toys to create a border around the Ouija board. I dug through the kids' unused game pieces, old craft supplies, and the miniture section at Hobby Lobby and we hot glued everything to the border of the table. We also glued some flatter, smaller objects to the legs. A few of the items we used:
-discarded dice in all colors and materials
-felt flowers
-checkers
-Scrabble tiles
-Clue cards (I was lucky enough to have a travel Clue set that had tiny cards with the characters, the weapons, etc.)
-Cameos
-marbles
-tiny witches brooms
-small straw hats
-plastic doll eyeballs
-game pieces
-plastic spider rings from Halloween with the ring part cut off
-bottle caps
-those cube shaped beads with letters on them
When you decoupage, it's fine to let things overlap. It's fine if you do a bad job of cutting out the images, because you'll cover them. It's supposed to look messy, so it's the perfect project for the half assed. Since we had no idea what we were doing (I tend to look at things like my ten year old does--"I could do that"--and then, just like him, be completely shocked when I can't), we just looked around Michael's and Hobby Lobby for something to coat the table so that nothing would fall off, no one (like kids, ahem) could pick off the toys, and you could set a drink on it without fear of destroying it. Remember, decorative stuff that isn't functional is just frivolous. So we bought a couple of different coatings for the table. Here's one:
http://www.amazon.com/Environmental-Technology-32-Ounce-Pour-On-Finish/dp/B000BZYYQ0/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1353261827&sr=8-6&keywords=resin
And here's the other:
http://www.amazon.com/DecoArt-TG01-36-Triple-Thick-8-Ounce/dp/B000WWM6QM/ref=sr_1_1?s=arts-crafts&ie=UTF8&qid=1353262707&sr=1-1&keywords=triple+thick+gloss+glaze
I think we actually brushed on the Triple Thick first, then poured on the Pour On finish afterwards. Unfortunately, these photos were taken before the final gloss coats, so they don't show the final look, which was a much thicker, resin-y coating that completely enveloped the 3D parts. Also, some of the decoupage glue hadn't yet dried clear, and you can still see it on the checkers, but you get the idea!
This is a bit of a time consuming project, in that you have to wait for glue to dry in between coats. Do it over a weekend where you'll have 20 minutes here and there to work on it, and put on a good movie. It fits in great with Darcy's decor, and it's still functional as a Ouija board. Happy gluing!
I had to edit this to add that I've become completely thrilled with the idea of decoupage that I want to do something in my house. I had bought an old, hideous 1000 pound coffee table for the loft/playroom upstairs and spray painted it white. Since it's a low, wide table, the kids all tend to use it for a stage (of course) and it's completely nicked and scuffed up. I thought it would be the perfect table for a project like this. My kids are really into legos, on and off, so I'm planning to buy the large base pieces and glue them to the table, then make a border around the edges. Not only will the lego bases discourage standing on the table (ever stood on a Lego? I'm pretty sure they used that as a form of torture in the Middle Ages), when they build their creations on the base, they will be harder to knock over. Alas, I keep losing out on eBay bids for the bottom pieces. One day...
