DIY Squirrel Surgery (DIY Decor)

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Remember my squirrel buddies? Let's recap... There's Ace, the one with the acorn, and Phil (short for Philbur, like Wilbur, as in the character from Charlotte's Web... "Willlbuurrrrrrr"), the one with the pinecone. 

They had a makeover here after this dollar store adventure.

After four coats of spray paint, I was still unable to get into a few small nooks and crannies... like this one, between the body and tail:

and this one, in Ace's... well, nostrils I guess.

So my "bright" idea was to use a paint brush to put spray paint into those holes. I put "bright" in quotation marks because it was only a bright idea in theory. In application, it left me with this...

Some brown-ish-pink-ish weirdness. What happened? I can only assume that, when agitated by a paint brush, the spray paint mixed with the original paint color (ugly brown-ness, a la this post). 

Not wanting to make things worse by coming up with another "genius" idea, I cut my losses and added another layer of spray paint in hopes of camouflaging the weirdness.  Sorry, Ace. Thanks for being the guinea pig -- er, I mean squirrel.

I had another "bright" idea (ah, it was a day of "bright" ideas) to let them sit in the sun on my patio. Too bad my clumsy self had to drop one... 

HE. LOST. A. TOE! 

Guess whose it was? Guess which squirrel, Ace or Philbur, was unfortunate enough to be dropped by his mommy and lose a toe? Philbur, of course. 

Rather than force Philbur to live a toe-less life, I decided to conduct emergency surgery. Meaning I whipped out the super glue (My right thumb and pointer finger are now covered in the rough remnants of an accidental superglue spill mid-surgery. My iPhone still refuses to recognize my thumb. I swear, it's a human thumb... or is it?! Muahahah).

Now he's rockin one of these situations:

But, in the end, it all worked out (and Philbur's ugly toe is less noticeable now that he's manning his book-guarding post)!

Here's some context for where they now live:

Ace            $1.00

Philbur       $1.00

Spraypaint $5.66*

Total         $7.99

*will be used on a few more projects from my dollar store adventure. So, really, the cost for this project is slightly less than above.

So there you have it. A Tale Tail Of Two Squirrels. Has anyone else spraypainted creepy little animals? Or anything else from the dollar store? Or been attacked by a squirrel? 

P.S. Guess what I got in the mail yesterday? It is black, was a gift from Chris, and rhymes with "external hardrive." Did you guess it? Yousosmart!

A Tale of Two Squirrels (DIY Decor)

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(...or should that be "A Tail of Two Squirrels?")

Carrie Bradshaw once said, "You can't be friends with a squirrel! A squirrel is just a rat in a cuter outfit!"


You shut your mouth, Carrie Bradshaw! 
Your show is over! 
You are canceled! 
And you're a fictional character, anyways!


Excuse the outburst...
I have two new squirrel friends.
They are squirrely.
And cute.

I found these squirrels at the dollar store... [Remember my Dollar Store Adventure?]



One has an acorn and one has a pinecone.
Thus, Acorn-bearer and Pinecone-bearer.
Thus, Ace and Phil.
Phil as in Philbur (rhymes with Willbur, as in Charlotte's Web).
Obviously.



I pictured them as bookend-ish decor...

As the guardians of the written word, if you will... 

And as I looked at them on the rack in the dollar store, I said... I'm going to take you home and spraypaint the heck out of you.

They asked if they could play first. I said okay. Here's the gif:

Anyways, it's not all fun and games in the Taylor household. We got down to business yesterday morning...

Design Master #626 Glossy White [From Michaels]

They were scared but they had each other for moral support.

-You ready, Ace?

-You bet your tail I am!

After the first coat, as you can see, there was still considerable dark detail showing through.  These babies are pretty detailed in their hind regions, what with the fluffy tails and all... so I figured we were in for at least three coats.

Here's Ace after his first coat. So much brown paint showing through. That rebellious squirrel!

After the second coat, it looks like it snowed! Yay, Christmas in July! 

Seriously, look how much cleaner Ace looks after his second coat! And Philbur too... No Philbur, I didn't forget you.

After coat three, they look way better -- but still needed one more coat before being decor-ready.

I'll be back in a bit when they're dried and done (and manning their book-guarding posts)!

Some Spraypointers:

1. Keep the spray 8-12 inches away from the object at all times unless you want goops and drips.

2. Keep moving! Sway your spray in paralel lines. As my favorite DIYer Sherry would say, "If you're a-sprayin, you should be a-swayin!"

3. Keep it thin! Don't obsess over tiny imperfections because you'll end up with that goop and drip all up in your spraypainting bidness. It's better to be patient (hard for me) and do 3 or 4 thin coats.

Sidenote: I was attacked by a squirrel once, I think. I was walking across campus at Rhodes and suddenly it was on me. I think it was trying to jump from one tree across the path to another tree and I just got in the way, but... it was on me and I freaked and ran and ah... that noise. I will never forget the noise it made when it was on me. Kind of like an evil sounding baby coo noise. NEVER.AGAIN.