Mirror Mirror on the wall

Using mirrors can be tricky, because what they reflect is not always what you want hanging on your wall.  I like to use mirrors across the room from windows because they reflect the outdoors and bounce light all around the room.  I knew I wanted to put mirror up in the dining area of our combination living and dining room.  Across from the "dining wall" is a large sliding glass door.

I was planning on using this mirror that I had made for a previous house:

All I did to make this mirror was to mount 8 12 inch mirrors onto a piece of plywood, and then frame it with some window casing.  Originally I was going to have black dowels separating the mirrors, but I did my math wrong, cut one of the casings too short - did not have the budget to buy another piece of casing so I had to make do with what I had.  It still turned out fine but it always bothered me.

When we moved in to this house that mirror wound up looking like this:

Whoops!!  At first I was upset, but then I realized I had an opportunity to right what I had wronged.

Back to the drawing board (or back to Hobby lobby for mirrors).  All they had were 8 inch mirrors, so I wound up making 2 sets of four mirrors.

This is a super easy project, and is pretty inexpensive - although moulding does add up - and it's best if you can catch the mirrors on sale.

For each one you'll need:

- a 24X24 piece of MDF (mine was 1/4 inch thick) $2.25

- 4 eight inch beveled mirros (you can usually find these in the wedding decoration aisle) $1.99 each

- 4 feet of lattice (I used 1 and 1/8 inches wide) - $1.20

- 8 feet of moulding (I used window casing and bought a little extra so there would be some room for error)

3.5 inches wide - $1.29 per linear foot

-Gorilla Glue

Total cost for each mirror= around $20!!

First I cut all my pieces, (Well, I had Jarrod do it this time so there would be no mistakes :-)), then doused them with some satin finish black spray paint.  I worked from the inside out, gluing down the lattice in the middle.  Once those were exactly where I wanted them, I put glued the mirrors down.  After the mirrors were in place, I glued the casings as well.  (I didn't want to nail the casings #1 because of holes to fill and #2 because I didn't want to budge the mirros out of place by nailing - or BREAK anything again)

This is what I wound up with:

Not bad for $20!

I'm linking this up to the Gorilla Glue party over at Shanty2Chic.  Thanks girls, for all of your inspiring ideas!!

P.S.  I'm sorry, I did read the rules and I'm disqualified from the contest because I don't have pictures of when I made these.