In which I get all artsy-fartsy

I saw a post on Cowgirl Shepard a few weeks ago of a wine bottle holder made of old stirrups.  I *loved* the idea, but not for wine.  We keep sunscreen and bug spray right outside our front door, just thrown on a chair.  I loved the wine holder idea so much, I thought I'd try it with the sunscreen and bug spray.

I called Mom and Bill to see if they had any old, unused stirrups.  Mom has a whole shed of "someday" tack.  You know, the tack you don't want to get rid of because you might need it someday.  Turns out she didn't have a spare set of stirrups, but Bill did.  Weird, I didn't expect him to be the one with the spare stuff, but I wasn't going to question it.

I took the old stirrups and screwed them to the wall outside of our front door and voila! sunscreen and bug spray holders.  I love them and they make me smile every time I pull up to the house.

Aren't they the cutest?

Close up just in case you couldn't see them properly :)

Now we have what we need within easy reach.  We can step outside, grab what we need, spray up and be on our way.

With all of the work we're doing under the tree with the picnic table and stuff, I thought I'd find another set of stirrups to put on a post there so we could have easy access there, too.  I stuck it in the back of my mind to find a consignment store to pick up another pair of used stirrups cheap.

As with so many of my brilliant ideas, my second set of bug spray holders got changed when I bought new boots.  I'd been dreading buying new boots for a couple of reasons: 1) boots are expensive and 2) I loved my blue Justin Gypsies.  But those boots had finally worn out.  I threatened to get them re-soled, but the insides were falling apart, too.  It was just plain time to suck it up and buy new boots.

Don't get me wrong, I love my new boots.  I do.  Now that I bit the bullet and bought them, they're lovely.  Less obnoxious than my blue ones, but lovely.  When it was time to throw my old boots out, I just couldn't do it.  I physically could not put those boots I've had since before Jay and I met into the trash can.  Instead, I decided to make the bug spray and sunscreen holders out of them.

Well-loved boots

I was surprised at how easy it was to cut these apart.

Jay punched holes for me and I stitched the bottoms shut with leather lacing.

A couple of screws to hold them to the post.

I would be lying if I denied being pretty proud of my artsy-fartsy crafts.  I love this place and told our neighbor L.E. that we were "nesting" and that she wasn't going to get rid of us any time soon.