Organized Clutter

I found these little wooden Jack O' Lantern unfinished boxes at Dollar Tree . I gave them an easy upcycle!

Besides decorating with real pumpkins and faux pumpkins in the fall, I like to repurpose junk and other items as pumpkins and Jack O' Lanterns. In the first photo, I found an orange rake head, tied raffia on it, and hung it outside my front door.

This wooden canister was a summer Goodwill find. I transformed it into easy, fun fall decor!

I found this small fall stencil pack at Joann Fabrics recently   while checking out the fall craft areas at several stores. There were 5 stencils in the package. There was also a Halloween stencil pack from Tulip.

I think it's a challenge to create holiday decor from garage sale and thrift shop finds, and stuff laying around your house. I purchased a box of old measuring cups at a public school garage sale a while back.  In today's post, I will repurpose them and some wooden spoons as rustic fall decor.

When I was helping my daughter move out of her old apartment, I brought home this coffee sign that her roommate had left behind. It was fun coffee sign, but sometimes, you can remake your old decor into "new" fun items.   I also brought home this metal pail planter that I had stenciled to hold the girl's "college era" mail.

Today I put together a round up of my past and present fall/autumn/Halloween projects and decorating ideas over the years. The first project is an oldie!  This Rustic Fall Candle Jar   was inspired by a catalog.  Click the links to see the details!  You may remember some of them.

 As you probably know, I like cutting boards.  I almost always pick them up at garage sales and thrift shops. These three were recent finds.  My project today will use the top and bottom cutting boards with handles.

Back on August 24th, I re-purposed this vintage vegetable safety grater into a "pumpkin" photo holder . Today, I   up-dated   my re-purposed grater pumpkin into a jack o'lantern.  

I can't believe my luck finding an old orange metal rake head at a local antiques/consignment shop.

 Today I am making a Jack o' Lantern out of an old funnel.

I had a busy fall and early winter crafting, re-purposing, and decorating for fall, Halloween and Christmas crafts in 2013. Let's recap: Cake Pan Junk Pumpkins

Here at Organized Clutter, I am constantly looking for ways to decorate and repurpose with vintage finds in my home and flower gardens.   My project today is for junior junkers.  Everything is magnetic so the Jack o'Lantern's face can be changed over and over with other junk drawer items.  Obviously not for children under three, but older children may like creating new pumpkin faces and expressions with magnetic junk. With kitchen ware and utensils in steady and ready supply inexpensively at the local thrift shops, I was able to re-purpose an assortment of junk pumpkins this fall.

I started my fall projects in August this year.   2013 will go down in blog history as the year of the "junk pumpkins", cake pan pumpkins, jello mold pumpkins, gear pumpkin, bicycle wheel pumpkin, a chef pumpkin, and a bun warmer pumpkin.   Let's look back at 22 posts featuring fall or Halloween projects or decor: 1.   In this post, I re-purpose a  vintage bun warmer as a pumpkin. 2.   My potting sink was a great spot to set up my  Chef Junk Boyardee. 3.   This project was inspired by a  vintage fall paint-by-number. 4.   I thought that  funnels looked a lot like fall cornucopias  in this coke crate vignette. 5.   The potting sink got a new look with  old lanterns with pumpkins and a berry sieve with Indian corn. 6.   Old plastic Burwood owl plaques get spray painted as   Halloween decor . 7.   Another  fall crate vignette. 8.   A re-purposed  gear junk pumpkin . 9.   The f...

Here are the items that I used to make a junk pumpkin chef:  a cloth dish towel, a pumpkin, a bucket, the top of a milk can, a white gourd, twigs, washers, nuts and an unknown metal part.  (maybe some sort of wrench)

It's October 1st today, and I just finished a Halloween project! My project started with the purchase of these 1977 Burwood owl plaques that I purchased thrifting for $3.  They are 3d molded or formed plastic, and this type of plaques and the owls too were popular back in the 1970's. I really liked the orange and black eyes. I thought they would give the owls a Halloween look.

Funnels are one of my new collections.   Yesterday I found this little white enamel ware funnel for $7.  It is 3" tall and 2 7/8" across the top.  The middle sized canning funnel is 2 1/4" tall and 3 7/8" across, and the larger canning funnel is 3" tall and 5" across.

Yes.  I did.  I made another junk pumpkin this year. I used some of this junk.  These junk parts were originally part of a knife sharpening tool my Grandpa had rigged up in his garage year's ago.  I blogged about this acquisition  here.

I just love to use collections in seasonal and holiday decorating.   This lady head vase is my very favorite.   Here she is starring in a Valentine's Day coffee table vignette.

My bike wheel has appeared on my blog in several posts. First here in my 2012 Christmas Mantel.