What Has Eight Legs & Holds Art?

Why an octopus of course! I know I haven’t shown y’all this pirate bedroom I’m always going on about, but the fact of the matter is I'm not quite finished with it.  Any normal person would be done by now, but the truth is I keep thinking of other things that would go well in there and I want to wait until it's all done.  It is so close to being finished.   
I got to thinking that my nephew needed a place to hang his art work and there are so many wonderful ideas out there, however I came up with this idea out of my own crafty little brain.  Mostly because I needed an excuse to play with my new overhead projector that I purchased off of craigslist, also because I wanted something to take up plenty of space on those red walls.

I began by finding a silhouette of an octopus on line and tracing is onto a transparency. 

I turned a half sheet of bead board paneling to the wrong side and traced the silhouette using my handy dandy overhead projector.  

Next I drilled several holes at different places on the board to accommodate the sharp angles. A skill saw can't make those sharp turns and drilling the pilot holes at the onset kept me from stopping during the cutting.

I cut out the octopus with a skill saw and sanded the edges with a detail sander. 

I painted the octopus with a blue sample I picked up at the Lowes’s that I watered down to achieve a more transparent wash than a solid paint job.  I dry brushed over the blue paint with a bit of off white. 

Lastly I used small screws to attach silver bulldog clips.  I had to use a split washer to keep the screws from coming out the back, plus it keeps the clips from spinning. 

I had to search the store room for the smallest screwdriver I could find, so it would fit through the clip itself.  Luckily I had one on hand.  I secured one clip for each of the legs and I was done. 

Major cuteness I think and I can’t wait to show you guys how it looks on the wall. 

Come back for the last pirate room project and the big reveal.  I promise it is almost finished, and if I’m lying y’all can make me walk the plank. 

UPDATE: Here is the finished product up in the finished room, what fun this was.