DIY Signs

When my kitchen had an empty space, I decided that I wanted to create a sign. My hubby brought home a couple of old pallets from work. One was really beat up, which was perfect!  It had the wear and tear on the wood to give my sign that aged look that I wanted.

First I tore the pallet apart. Then I cut the wood down to the length I needed for my sign. Since I wanted the sign to look like it was an actual sign from an old coastal resort, I made it quite large. Then my little helper sanded it just a little so that we wouldn't get splinters. 

I used my Cricut to create stencils. I traced them on the wood to figure out the placement and how large of an area I needed to paint for the background. Taped it off and painted it Antique White. Because I was looking for the aged look, I wasn't worried about covering the wood. I let the wood grain show through.

Then stencil the letters. Once I had all the letters stenciled, I free handed shadows and highlights to each of the letters to give them dimension. Then I used tracing paper to trace the nautical compass in the middle. Using the tracing, I painted the compass. Once all the paint was dry, I lightly sanded.

Finished product

In it's new home.

As you can see, we have lights on top of our cabinets. After putting them up there around the nutcrackers at Christmas, we decided we really like it being lit up, so we left them.

I hope you like and that it inspires you to go create!
Thanks,
Holly