DIY Animal Bookends

 

 I've been haunted - in a good way - by these golden pig bookends from CB2 for months now.

So. Fantastic.



But the $30 price tag was more than I wanted to spend, and I knew I could bust out a DIY version anyway. (Hello, Pinterest.) But after mentioning this to my kids, they (and here's a shocker) couldn't bring themselves to sacrifice any toys in the name of house accessorization.

 

Fair enough.

 

You can imagine my tenderized heart when I came home from the grocery store a coupla days ago and found these lovelies waiting for me on the kitchen counter with a note from my 8-year-old son.

"For Mom. Carson."

 

(I think my heart would have been even more tender if I knew what those front two animals even are. Armadillos? Anteaters? Some prehistoric creature that doesn't even exist today?)

 

They're small animals, but he offered them so sweetly, I couldn't back out now. I figured I just wouldn't cut them in half but instead use two animals (rather than two halfs of an animal) as a set.

 

So I found some thin wooden blocks, measured, cut, and sanded them.

 

I glued two pieces of wood together first and used a toothpick to smooth out the excess.

 

Then I put small drops of glue on each paw and glued the animals down.

Here they are, awaiting the spray primer step...

...which can't come soon enough, if you ask me. Those red eyes have got to go. Creepy! Who designed these kid toys, anyway?

So. Primed and painted with Krylon metallic gold spray paint. In hindsight, it would've been easier to spray paint the stand and the animals thoroughly prior to gluing them together. Not a huge deal, but consider it a little tippy-tip to you from me. You're welcome.
 

Oh, and I also hot-glued four little dots to the bottom of each frame so they wouldn't slide whilst trying to hold up books.

For a super-fast, super-free project, I totally love how they turned out. Even knowing those red eyes are lurking under the bear's paint doesn't deter my love.

Any repurposing project that can make two I-have-no-idea-what-kind-of-animal-it-is figurines look even remotely chic? Winner winner chicken dinner.

I was thinking the gold might end up being a little stuffy-looking, but even with paperbacks they look great. I guess it's hard to make a bear-elephant duo look too stuffy...anywhere.

K, for real now. Here they currently live, on my super simple living room mantel.

 

There you have it. Now off you go, to raid your child's toy animals bin.

 

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