April showers bring May flowers. If you’ve been on Pinterest lately, you’ve seen them… those cute umbrellas with flowers spouting out the top, hanging on the door for a fun Spring welcome!

Repurposing a Vintage Umbrella

I started to shop for a vintage umbrella on Ebay… and then found a vintage parasol on the local Facebook garage sale site, so went with that because I could get it right away, however… it’s a little too bright red for my taste, but I though maybe it’d still work OK once it was up and displayed, so I continued to pursue the vintage umbrella on door look.

Command Hook

For hanging the parasol on the the door, I used a Command hook. If you’ve never used them, I highly recommend them. (you’ll find a shopping link for them at the end of this post)

Here’s how they work… There are 3 components to the hooks…

The back part you put on the wall or door first, the actual hook front part, and the adhesive strip. That strip is what, when you’re done with the hook, just pulls down and stretches until it cleanly comes off the wall or door, just like magic. So you’ll need to replace the strip with a new one the next time you go to re-hang the hook again, but the other two plastic parts of the hook you re-use.

I used a heavy duty hook for the door, thinking that the wind may move the parasol around a little and wanted to be sure it hung on well. (that’s actually the same hook I used this Christmas for the deer antlers I hung in the living room)

They’re super easy to install, the sticky strip is marked which side goes to the back of the hook and which goes to the wall or door. It recommends you put it on and let it set for a while before you put weight on the hook.

Once the back was placed on the door, I just slid the hook part over it, it gently snaps into place over the back.

Ta-da it’s done. When it’s time to remove the hook, slide the hook part back up, and pull the tab of the sticky strip straight down and it just stretches and like magic completely comes off, not a spot of sticky residue! I love them and how great they’ve worked for me inside and out. (I used them at our former house on the pair of french doors too)

The Vintage Umbrella I Found

Ok, now back to the actual decoration…

Here’s the vintage parasol, it really is cute with the wooden handle. then I grabbed a bunch of faux flowers from the dollar tree… which again, may be part of the issue with this too… I think just white flowers of a little better quality would have worked better…

Stuffed to Look a Little Fuller

I wanted the parasol to look kind of full in it’s half-closed state of hanging on the door, so I stuffed some plastic grocery bags inside it.

Vintage Ribbon

Then I grabbed my collection of new and vintage ribbons, most of which I bought on Ebay a few years ago… what a great resource for fun vintage ribbons!

Wired the Bouquet

To keep the bouquet together and not wind up having a stem or two slip down into the parasol, I bundled them together, (I couldn’t find my florist wire, so I just tied them with jute twine)

That was it… I then stuffed the flowers in the top of the parasol, tied the teal ribbon around the middle of it and…

hung it on the door.

But…

I gotta say, I don’t ‘love’ it…

I think it’s a combination of the bright colors and cheap flowers… it’s just not my favorite.

I do love the wooden handle of the parasol though, if that’s worth anything.

Umbrella All Done

It’s still hanging on the door, I’m going to go look for some white, better quality flowers and see if I can make it work. Otherwise, consider it for sale! 😉 (you like it? it’s your… if I can get my $25 back out of it, I’d be thrilled, ha ha)

That’s just how it goes sometimes, even for designers… some things are a miss. And I’m not too proud to say that it happens to me too. But I’m also not afraid to keep trying new stuff in design and decorating. To me that what it’s all about, trying new things and see what one likes and how to achieve it. Maybe a vintage umbrella on door look at our 100 year old house, just isn’t going to be pleasing to my eye, or maybe it’s the colors that need to be changed, or maybe it’s the flowers… One thing for sure though, I’ll keep trying, and figure out just what will please my eye.

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