Hand painted – Karla's Cottage

Creepy clowns, cutesy ghosts, and more

Good JuJu, Halloween treats, Hand painted

By Karla Nathan / September 1, 2025

My booth is ready for guests next weekend at Good Juju’s First Friday weekend.

There is a full display of Halloween inspired paintings hat I made on our Florida trip in July.

If they go over well, I have lots of ideas for Christmas paintings too. And I’ve been setting aside old book pages that will coordinate with the themes.

This scary clown might be my fave.

Although the way it is displayed doesn’t really show it off.

I have a clown shelf on this rack, and I’m thinking of a little redo before the sale.

Haha! I think I just said that I was all set up and ready for our weekend, didn’t I?

There is always room for a little tweak or add in!

It’s four more days till our sale, so I think I’ll zip into KC today and do a mini shuffle. I found some more clowns at a flea market and they are “dying” to be a part of my creepy set up.

Making over Mom’s old hutch

family, Hand painted, Hand Painted Furniture

By Karla Nathan / April 26, 2025

When I was a kiddo, my mom got a new dining set. An Early American hutch with matching table and chairs. I know I was pretty young when the change from chrome and Formica to a maple set happened, and for the rest of her life, she stayed with that piece.

After her passing, I took it home with me and gave it a makeover. At my house, it got some cottagey themed roses, with hydrangeas, and a smattering of holly hocks inspired by mom’s flower bed. I brought some holly hock starts to Kansas and plant too, but no luck with growing them.

Here it is in its original wood tones with my sisters in front of it at mom’s.

And at my home used in a magazine shoot. I used it a while, but while I cared about it sentimentally, it wasn’t an ideal fit for our home. At that time, we hadn’t remodeled yet and there was only one wall in the living room it would fit onto, it was too big for the dining room. A niece offered to give the piece a home and has had it since then.

But now, she is moving to a smaller place, and Sissy is finishing her move into a bigger one, so it now lives at Sissy’s big, new home.

And it’s time for another makeover. From Early American maple, to pastel Romantic Cottage/Shabby Chic, onto a kinda boho, Sundance style. I adore Sundance clothes and jewelry, often using them as inspiration in my embroidery and beading. And was pleased to use their furniture as a model for painting too.

Sis called the style Southwest, and it’s her house, so she knows what she likes and has, but to me, Sundance is a bit different from that. It’s western, but more mountain ski lodge than desert adobe.

Next post, I will show you the third go round of this hutch.

I cannot resist an unloved and rejected doll

Hand painted

By Karla Nathan / October 3, 2024

No one bought this doll from Beth at Juju, so she placed it out in the parking lot where we have extra space for either clearance goods or overflow. She told me to take it, and I said, only if it’s still there at the end of the sale.

At the end of the day, there she was, forlorn and left in the gravel, overlooked by hundreds of shoppers.

Poor Ani.

Was it the “substance” congealed on some parts of her? Or possibly her crunched in chest? Probably that look on her face.

I redid her face in the style of vintage, French sitting dolls.

After vigorously scrubbing off the uhm, substance of some kind.

Next was a new hairstyle made of angora. I brought the hair forward onto her throat so she no longer had a neck like a WWE wrestler.

I don’t sew, her delightful princess gown is pieced together from other doll clothes and bits of lace then glued into place.

The only thing missing? Maybe a crown? She deserves one to feel better after all the rejection she faced.

Oh, and maybe a bouquet of flowers to hide her muppety looking (but freshly painted) hands.

A Wonderful, Wonder Horse Redo

Hand painted, how-to projects

By Karla Nathan / August 20, 2024

Last month at the Good Juju venue, I had a western/equestrian theme going. In it, I used vintage Wonder Horses.

Here is how it looked on display.

Now that I am done with that idea, I thought I’d reuse them for the holidays, but turn them into more of a carrousel look. First step was primer.

Then a textured white paint as the base, a darker color for the mane and tail, black for hooves. I painted the saddles tan.

The eyes were painted with the same black and tan, then I brushed a coffee colored glaze over the entire horsey, a little bit at a time, wiping off as I went.

To give them the holiday sparkle that I was looking for, I covered the tan “leather” with Elmer’s glue and sprinkled a shimmery gold powder over them. After that dried, I used a silver Rub N Buff to highlight some areas.

The plan is to hang them from the ceiling over the entryway of my booth. I have gold glittered ornaments and vines to use too.

I’ll put dowel rods through the holes, and suspend them from fishing line tied to the rods. This project makes me so excited to decorate for Christmas!

But then again, I always am counting down till I get to do that.

Hand painted flannel shirts

Hand painted, how to's

By Karla Nathan / August 17, 2024

Back in the late 80’s and early 90’s, I painted tee shirts and sold them in stores all over, including at Silver Dollar City in Branson, at crafts shows, and local shops.

I painted so many that I said I was done forever. (One year I painted 1,000). Since then, I’ve whipped up a few as gifts for new babies, but that’s about it. I did a couple for Sugarwings, but my heart just wasn’t in it.

Recently, the idea of painted shirts was again lurking in my head. I’d accumulated a pile of flannels that I wanted to sell this fall at Good Juju, and considered embroidering them, but knew it would take hours and I could not sell them for enough to pay for my time.

So, I thought I’d try a few painted ones. I’m much faster with a brush than a needle.

First, they needed to be slightly bleached out to soften the plaid design. Which was simple, since Sugarwings and I had been experimenting with bleach painting last week. I dunked these flannels while we had our bleach mess set up in the driveway, and left them in the sun to dry and was happy with the less vinbrant look of the plaid after they were done.

After a quick job with a brush and acrylic paint mixed with fabric medium, they dry for 24 hours, get heat set with an iron, and then washed and dried.

That might sound like a lot of work, but it all goes pretty quickly. Please wish me luck with them, I hope they sell!

New looks for old clothes

Hand painted

By Karla Nathan / August 8, 2024

When I asked Sugarwings to clean out the closet and get rid of anything not worn, the response was, “Those aren’t Goodwill donations, they are craft supplies”.

That began our deep dive into bleach dying, fabric markers, ice dying, and rebooting old pieces into new ones.

Here is one that I made for myself. I’m also working on some Jean jackets and flannel shirts for Goid Juju.

My grandfairy is fond of spritzing or painting bleach onto black shirts. We have been slightly obsessed and spent entire days doing little else.

While Dewdrop was here, we bought a lot of new school clothes, but I am sensing that for Sugarwings, most of the favorite back to school outfits will be the hand crafted ones. And that the pile of Goodwill drop offs isn’t going to be very big.

Oops, the closet is ending up more crowded than when the clean out began.

A little chance to do some painting

flowers, Hand painted, paintings, wallpaper

By Karla Nathan / September 4, 2023

A friend posted a back to school photo of her and her mini me. It was a perfect little snapshot of joy.

I loved it so much, I just had to do a quick mixed media sketch of it. I will be gifting this to her next time I see her.

While my paints were out, I decided to do a rose painting for a kind soul who had gifted me with boxfuls of treasures during her de-stashing. I could never express my full gratitude for her generosity enough. I hope she knows how much it was appreciated.

I wracked my brain to figure out what to send as a thank you. Because of her major clean out, I thought she probably wouldn’t want more “stuff”, but a card was not enough. After perusing her IG, and seeing how much she loved gardening, so I am hoping that this flower will be something she likes.

Painting with grout? Yep

antiques/junking, cottage, Hand painted, how-to projects

By Karla Nathan / July 2, 2023

For years, I have been using the grand fairies’ outgrown craft table as a side table in my living room. Not because I loved it, but because it was the exact size I needed at the holidays to set the Christmas tree up on. It wasn’t ugly, it was just a simple, round, white table. But it wasn’t anything I adored, that’s for sure.

Then, I found this table at a garage sale for FREE. Well, basically free. The lady sold me an entire car load of stuff for twenty bucks, and the car was stuffed to the brim. I felt like this table was a bonus thrown in with all the inventory I’d bought.

Here is how it started, perfectly nice, no problems, just a little too traditional for me.

I wanted it to look old. Well, that’s not exactly right because it already is old.

It needed to look like it had been painted and repainted over time. More cottagey.

So, first it was primed, then I mixed up grout into gray paint and gave it a thick, gloopy coat of that. Next, white paint, then sanding the clumps away. There were some ugly spots that didn’t sand well, so I touched up with the white again, then a glaze of umber went over it all and was wiped away.

To finish, a polycrylic clear coat went over that.

The paint looks properly mistreated now.

My Christmas tree will look great on its new pedestal! And I think I do adore this one. Bye-bye to the kiddo’s craft table.

A flamingo of a different color

Garden, Good JuJu, Hand painted

By Karla Nathan / June 25, 2023

A box of flamingos was gifted to me through a friend who’d had them first given to her. They seemed to be just what I needed for my summer display at Good Juju.

But first, the flock needed a group makeover. I sprayed them with a bonding primer, painted them with acrylic craft paints, then wired and glued flowers to their tummies.

Uhm, you might have noticed our grass. Or lack of it, I should say. My husband retired from working at the world’s largest country club company, so he knows grass and the principles of growing a perfectly groomed, lush expanse of it, but we just don’t care that much out here in the country. If I could, I’d have all ground covers, dandelions, and clover without a single blade of grass.

Anyway, back to my feathered friends- ta dah! Previously, I’d had some umbrellas with flowers in my booth, then used those for garden party decor.

After leaving them outside in a storm, they were done for. And of course, I can’t waste anything, so I pulled the flowers off and reused them on these gals.

I don’t know if anyone else notices the displays I create up high, but I sure get a lot of joy in making them.

Mushroom paintings

Hand painted, hand painted signs, mushrooms

By Karla Nathan / April 12, 2023

The other day, my husband was building a new raised garden bed for us and was using old fencing around it to keep the hens out. He left a pile of these trimmed pieces on the ground after adjusting the fence height. They caught my eye.

The wood was just what I needed for some little mushroom paintings that I’d been thinking about doing.

I scrubbed then sealed the old wood, front and back, before painting on it. Then added my schroomies.

The paintings are pretty simple, so I was able to keep the cost down. I’d like to do more, I enjoyed these and I have got a bucket full of wood trimmings to use. But between my concussion and not knowing if theses will sell well or not, I’m holding back on making more for now. (How mature and unexpected of me)

The garden beds turned out wonderfully! Once we get some dirt and get started, I’ll be sharing those.