Written by contributor Josiah Lowe of The Burlap Bag

We’re all done with our Thursday “Elements of Design” series – now Lauren and I are going to provide you with some cheap & easy design projects every Thursday.

Today I am going to show you how to make some super hip and modern art for your kitchen. The subject we are going for is the classic bacon and egg. So to start this little project I broke down the basic shapes of each food. The egg is circular (well, for the most part!). And the bacon is mostly linear.

The Yolk

There’s several ways to paint the yolk. You could just wing it and paint a yellow circle.
But I don’t like my circle skills and wanted it to be pretty perfect so I made a stencil. I traced the bottom of a candle on a cereal box and then cut out the circle. Then I painted with acrylic paint inside of the circle to get my perfect yolk.

The Bacon

(mmm, aren’t you hungry just thinking about it?)

Here is where we get a little more modern in our design. Bacon is generally long and rectangular. The strips of delicious fat and meat mimic the bacon’s general rectangular form so we will simplify those strips to also be rectangles. We are going to simplify the color palette to just red and white – no light pinks or color mixing here.

Once again, there’s several ways to paint the bacon. You could just wing it and paint some different sized lines.

But I wanted these to be pretty linear so I made another “stencil”. I used two pieces of paper to cover the canvas so that there was only about 1 inch showing. I tried to make the two pieces of paper as parallel as possible for our first strip of meat on the bacon. I used a small amount of paint to the blank canvas to create a more organic/natural look to the bacon. I then made the stencil smaller and painted another line. Letting it dry in between each “meat strip”, I did the whole process one last time with a thin line in the middle. You can totally play with the line width. And now you have a piece of bacon!

We put our paintings in some frames. Framing is a fantastic way to make awesome art even better. It gives the work a sense of finality or completeness. Our paintings are 5×5 in simple black 5×5 frames. (We actually used old frames we had lying around… and painted directly on the back of those papers that come inside the frames! Ha! So this project cost us… $0)
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We’ve covered ordering your holiday cards, organizing your holiday calendar, planning your holiday gift giving, and prepping your holiday budget. What’s next?

This week’s task is one of my favorites, and though I start it the weekend after Thanksgiving, it lingers until December 24. I like the personal challenge of upcycling, going handmade, and otherwise thirfting as much as possible, and the kids love this just as much as myself (if not more).

I bet it’s one of your favorites, too.
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It’s already mid October, and I hesitate to even write that, because that just doesn’t seem possible. Wasn’t it just springtime?

Ask people to name their favorite season. Without fail, I’ll bet you fall is the most common response. Be it college football, sweater weather, crunching leaves, or pumpkin lattes, there’s something just about everyone can find to love.

My problem with fall, however, is that it’s just so darn busy. Not sure if it’s the start of the school year or what, but I always start off with these lofty ambitions to for fall-ish activities, and then I blink, and it’s Christmas.

Thanks to Pinterest, I’ve found more fall ideas for crafts, decor, food, and activities than I could ever possibly accomplish. I’m motivated and inspired.

Here are my favorite fall finds around the Internet—nothing specifically Halloween or Thanksgiving, just celebrating the season itself. I know I won’t do all of these, but these are great ideas nonetheless. I’ll be satisfied doing three or four.

And of course, add your own favorites in the comments.
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