Now this is different ....well maybe not but we are fixing to make our Pine cone Cottage birdhouse in a totally different way ...at least try . This is why we are calling it our " Hatch able Gourd " you know kinda like well hatching an egg ??
We just decided to cut one of our gourds in half,in a way that we thought we would be able to use for one of our birdhouses or pine cone roofed birdhouses.. So here you go ....I don't know how many of you have actually ever seen the inside of a dried gourd ....so if not I will explain a little .....
On the inside of the gourd is a sack that is full of the gourd seeds. After the gourd is dry which could take anywhere from 6 month to a year depending on the size of the gourd. like egg gourds , martins or bushel the smaller they are the quicker they dry ! We leave them right out on the vine in the garden where they lay even after the vines are all dried up and dead. After that they are usually all dried & in most, the the lining shrinks away from the sides and the seeds will shake around ( this is where the Maraca it's little musical shakers come from)
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| This is what a gourd Maraca looks like |
Usually we clean out the gourds through the hole we put in the gourd to make the birdhouse and believe me it is a little time consuming to be able to pull out All of the lining and the seeds ! Sometimes the seed sack inside the gourd doesn't pull away from the sides but that's not to much of a problem....the problem is when the seed sack dries up into the size of a softball and is hard as a baseball and you still have to get tat sack out if you want to use the gourd especially if your using it as a birdhouse ! There have been times when just the gourd cleaning scrapper and the oversized hemostats or your fingers just won't work you have to pull out the big tools ,,,like a drill with a long drill bit on it to be able to drill at that seed sack ball little hits at a time until you get it to break apart ...that is if your steady enough not to drill through the gourd in other places by mistake...
Finally after all the lining with the sack of seeds is removed is when we can decide how we want to finish it . This is what we have done to this " hatch able " gourd so far ! We ended up taking the top and layering it with pine cones ,now to finish off the bottom of the birds house lets see if we can come up with a Unique way of making this birdhouse a bird home !
We hope you enjoyed this little blog post of the anatomy of a gourd...the first time I every decided to use gourds as my painting pallett it was so ...cool that when we arrived at the farm, the farmer was so gracious to take us out in his fields on his 4 wheeler ( there was still snow in the ground it was like April ) and educate us on the growing and harvesting of gourds. He even let us pick right out of the fields ..We had such a GREAT time that I/We havebeen hooked ever since and it's been about 18 years .... Still LEARNING but having FUN ...
Would Love to hear from you ..
Do you have a question about gourds or painting on them ?
How did you get started ?
Do you use gourds ?
Do you paint on gourds ?
Do you paint ?
What is your hobby ?
Please leave a Comment below
Until The Next Time,
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Aren't these lanterns just gorgeous...I just fell in Love with them when I saw them and All sorts of painting ideas started running through my mind !! Lanterns to me remind me ( especially all these Lanterns ) of the "ROMANTIC PAST " .. You know ...Don't you ? 
The lanterns are of all different sizes and the glass in them are very unusual .The small ones above are about 8 inch's H x 14 in. round . I painted One large rose on each side of these with green leaves . All our Lanterns come with battery operated candles , the small ones of course come with tea light candles. These small ones we have listed in our Etsy Shop www.etsy.com/shop/inmypaintedgarden. 
