You Have My Whole Heart Sign Finished

I finally finished my sign!  Whew, glad that is done.  I like the way it turned out, but it was such  a challenge for me to figure out how to do the lettering.  It took a couple of different tries before I found a system that worked.

I bought 3 pieces of wood fencing that were 6 feet long and had the wonderful guys at Home Depot cut them in half for me {I love this service}.

I found these 5″ stencils at Home Depot while browsing for the wood.   As it turned out, they were the same letters my inspiration picture used!

I then bought pine 1 x 2′s and had them cut to size for the back to make a frame. {I kinda guessed the sizes of the lengths while I was in the store, and in the end I had to trim an inch or two off in order for them to fit}  But this is how I put the frame together.

I pre-drilled wholes on the 1 x 2′s on each board and across the top and bottom { tip, this helps from the pine from splitting when you screw in your screws}.  Then I screwed in 1 1/4″ screws to secure the boards to the frame.  At this time I also screwed in heavy duty picture frame hooks and wire. {sorry I forgot to take a picture of the screws and wire on the frame}

I painted the front of the sign with Arizona White interior paint from my stash. But you can use whatever white paint you have on hand.

Then I laid out my stencils and sprayed the backs with Krylon easy tack re-positional glue. Make sure you get the re-positional spray,  that way you can adjust the stencils and remove them easily when your done.

I started at the bottom piece of the wood because I knew they were going to be the longest letters on all the boards.  Once I positioned the letters, I used black acrylic paint and painted in the letters using the stencils.  And then I just worked my way up the sign, lining up the first letter and last letter with the bottom wording

Notice anything in this picture?  Yeah, I spelled “you” wrong!  That is what I get for trying to hurry myself.  Luckily it was an easy fix

I let the paint dry for at least 24 hours, then took my hand sander, and lightly sanded the whole sign. {you can use a sanding sheet if you don’t have a hand sander}

So here is the original signAnd here is mine

 I have to wait for my daughter and her husband to finish purchasing their first house.   Where I will be hanging it right in between these two windows above their bed that goes in that spot. Oh and new wall color and drapes will just set it all off,  I can’t wait to see it in it’s final resting spot

***Update.  The sign ended up going over their dresser instead of this wall. Their bed faces this wall so it is the first thing they see when they wake up.  Love that!

You can see how I transformed that Craigslist dresser here