Crafting gourds for additional income

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

I finally have the space to plant gourds, like dipper, birdhouse, bushel basket and loofa. My hubby bought me a woodburning kit for val day yesterday (my request) so now I'm thinking ahead. Researching how to use the kit to decorate gourds for sale (so we can afford some home repairs). Maybe some simple but beautiful and unusual projects. Believe me, I'm no artist but ... surely surely surely I can come up with something my carpal tunnel hands can do with our gourds.

Thinkiing I can slice the dried loofa and dip into soap and sell those.

Wondering if anyone else here does this? Pictures? Technique? Net profit (estimate)?

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

Looking at some books of intricate gourd crafting. Wow. Is it possible a non-artist person could create such amazing works of art?

Maybe woodburning something else. Small but beautiful.

Still looking for input.

 

[Beekissed]

With the loofah, just wrap the sponge in tinfoil a couple of wraps but making sure a liquid would not leak out easily, form the tinfoil to the shape of the sponge with a squeezing of the hand, and just pour your soap into this form, sit it upright in your fridge or freezer until solid, then take it out and let it sit for a little while. Remove the tinfoil and slice your soap bars that way. Makes for very cute, cross cut sections of loofah soap. You can even drill a small hole in one of the sections of the sponge/soap and place a cord in it for hanging in the shower...folks seem to like that.

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

hmmm.... wheels are turning!

 

[pinkfox]

the nice thing with "cottage crafts" is they dont have to be perfect...sure some of the gourd art out there is spectacular, but ive also seen birdhouse gourds that looked to be painted by a 2 yr old selling for $25 a peice so no need to worry about skill, practice, have fun and if worse comes to worse...invest in some stencils!

perosnally i want to do loofa and birdhouse to start out with...loofa for soap like has alreayd been described and birdhouse for...well...birdhouses (the first couple of batches would go in my own garden too...

might be worth taking a look over at etsy and see what other folks are selling at what kind of prices.

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

good idea, about lookin at etsy.

plus i'm waiting for a "how to sell on etsy" book to come into the library. we're like 4th on the hold list. (tapping foot).

didn't realize that birdhouse gourds could sell for $25. gonna have to do some math now.

 

[Dawn419]

Here's some of the decoupaged gourd crafts that I did several years ago. I did them mainly as gifts for family and friends but everyone said that I should have been selling them. I'd love to get back into doing them again...when I have more room.

Gourd PLanter:

Birdhouses:

A couple of Toad Houses:

A Sewing Basket:

 

[CheerioLounge]

Dawn! Those are cool! Y'all have got my wheels spinning now!

 

[MyKidLuvsGreenEgz]

Wow, Dawn! Those look amazing! I haven't come across decoupaging gourds ... how is it done? Maybe a little tutorial here?

 

[Dawn419]

They're easy to do. The worst of the work, to me, is cleaning out the inside of the gourds.

Give me about 30 minutes to finish hauling in water and I'll explain how I do these, okay!