How to make shabby chic crates for dolls

Hello everyone! How's the end of the summer going?

I'm still on Mr. Monster's laptop because mine is on the technical service. We don't know anything about it and we haven't received any news. We are affraid the technical service is closed in august, which would mean I will be without a computer for a whole month. I just hope to get it in time before University starts. 

The good thing about not having my computer is that, when Mr. Monster needs his, I spend my time doing some crafts. One of the last things I did are this doll size worn out doll crates. 

 First I started with the base. I cut 5 popsicle sticks into 7,5 cm pieces. Then I aligned them and glued them together with two cut sticks going across. I used white glue and it worked perfectly.

Then I cut 4 popsicle sticks into pieces as wide as the narrowest part of the base. When I cut a piece, I like to sand the edges to make it smooth and remove some cutting imperfections

 Then cut two pieces to go across and glue them at each edge. Repeat for the other size. Now we shoud have 2 pieces that look like this.

Start glueing the pieces together. I used a paint can to hold the pieces in place while drying. 

Then cut 6 pieces to go across the longer sizes and glue them in place. I started by glueing the bottom one, then the top one and finally the middle one. 

And this is what we have now. 

Once the glue is completely dryied, it's time for painting. I want to give it a shabby chic look using two colors. For the base color I chose black. I used Acualux, the same paint I used for the table and the chair.

After 4 hours you can apply the wax in the areas you want the paint to come off. I apply it with a thin brush and cotton. 

The wax will take arount 4 hours to dry. Once it has dryied it's time to apply the second color. This time I chose this acrylic from Americana Decor called Sea Breeze. 

Let the paint dry for at least 2 hours and then it's time to sand it. This time I used an scourer (the same one you would use to clean the dishes) to sand it and it worked much better than the steel wool.

And here it is!

 While I was waiting for everything to dry, I started working on a second crate. I did it following the same steps, only this time I made it smaller and only used 4 sticks for the base and 3 for the sides.

Also, I only used two pieces to go across the longer sides. 

For this one, I chose the dark turquoise I used for the chair  for the first coat.

For the second coat, I chose I light gray from Americana Decor called Dove Gray.

I didn't use as much wax as in the other crate and it was harder to sand. 

Finally, here it is.

It took me more or less 2 or 3 nights to finish them. The crates themselves were easy to do, but the drying times of the paint is what took me longer. It's quite an easy craft, and so much fun to do. You can experiment with it and do different crate designs. I chose to give them this distressed look, but you can just paint them in solid colors or stain them with a varnish.

So what do you guys think? Have you been working on some crafts?

M.C.