Stars and Stripes: Wood Creations Guest Post

  I was super excited to hear that the wonderful people at Wood Creations wanted us to do a guest post for them.  We all seriously love this store!  If I'm not careful I can get into lots of trouble and go a little crazy with the cute projects in that store....... 

I was also excited that they wanted us to do a 4th of July themed one.  I am seriously lacking in my patriotic decor so I loved the chance to do this project.  there are sooooo many cute projects there so you need to scurry on over there and get yours =)

Ok, now on to the tutorial:

This project was actually pretty simple to do.  The hardest part was deciding which papers I wanted to use for it =)

"Stars and Stripes"

Here is my finished product.  Now I'll show you the different steps I used to get to it.

Start out with your unfinished wood.  I was happy that the stars came with the holes already in them to thread the wire through.  

Start painting your letters.  There's a lot of painting since the letters a bit bigger so feel free to recruit some help like I did.  =)  The colors I used for my letters were red, blue and silver (it was a light silver that covered the wood better then white)

I painted the bead board part of the star silver as well.  It took a couple coats.  Then when it was dry I sprayed it with some glitter to make it different the the rest of the star..  You can't see the glitter too well in the picture, but it's a subtle glitter that has lots of reds, blues, and silvers in them.  It went perfect with it and didn't overpower the rest of it.

Then, once all my letters were dry, I figured out which ones I wanted to do scrapbook paper on and then which patterns I wanted to use.  That took more time for me to decide than anything.  =) 

I just traced an outline the letters and shapes and then cut it out.  Don't worry about them being perfect (unless you are a perfectionist and you like to have the edges exact)

Next get out your trusty mod podge and do a layer on the letters and shapes that you want to put scrap paper on.  Then take the paper and smooth it down on the wood.  To make sure and get all the bubbles out you could run something with a straight edge, like a credit card, over it.  Then let it set and dry for a few minutes.

Since my lines and edges weren't exact, I got some sandpaper and sanded the excess off.  This also gives the edges a distressed look when you are finished, which I love.  You can distress it as much as you want but if you don't want a whole lot, just sand the very edge and it will get the paper off (or you could use an exact-o-knife to make it straight) 

The next step, put your vinyl on.  Make sure it is smooth and straight.  I like to seal my paper and vinyle with a layer of mod podge over top as well.  (I have kids that like to play with the letters so they need a little extra help to withstand them =)  ) Then let it dry for a little while.

Then you can start adding your finishing touches.  I decided to add a few extra stars and I used wire to wrap around the letters instead of ribbon.  To give a swirly look to the wire just wrap it around a pencil or pen and then slide it off.

I did little curly cues with the wire in the cent of the stars

I did scrap paper on the star and then my sparkly bead board star.  I was hoping takings the picture in the sun would show the sparkles but it didn't work like I thought.  

I added some stars to the "S."  I sprayed the "t" with some glitter too. I added some wiring with some curls to a few letters.

For my letter "R" I did a star in the middle where hole would usually go. (those are also sprayed with glitter) I also sprayed the "S"  with some glitter spray too.  In person the glitter is more noticeable and looks great.  It gives it a subtle sparkle.

This was a fun project to do.  Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to do it and to share it with everyone.  I look forward to visiting the store a lot and getting more super cute crafts to do (just don't tell my husband where the extra money is going.....=) )  This is one of my favorite stores. I love that they have so many styles of crafts and that we take home the unfinished project and make it our own.  Keep up the good work, Wood Creations!!!

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