"I Am" Sign

A while ago I saw this sign and when I was going back through my  "One Day I will Get Around To Making This" list over the weekend, it caught my eye again and the urge to be crafty.  Over the past week between ruffles and signs, I have rightly earned the name "Miss Busybody" in my family.

I started with a piece of pine wood that was about 28"x36". Of course you can make this any size you want. Make sure to use a soft wood though so that when you transfer your letters, you will see them. I painted the wood cream... of course.

Next, choose the words and fonts you want on your sign. This is the time to have fun and be creative!

The font sizes I used ranged from 250 all the way up to 700 (I am). Once you have them printed out (I just used my home printer), lay them out on your piece of wood and tape them in place. As you can see, most of my words didn't come out on one piece of paper. I then cut the letters and arranged them where they needed to go. I even overlapped a few of the words. Just make sure that you are getting them perfectly horizontal and level (this is when my husband advised me to use a carpenter square) or you will end up with words slanting all over the place. I speak from experience on this one because I forgot to go back and fix where I had the "I am" and didn't see until after it was painted and up on the wall that it was crooked! Isn't every project supposed to have at least one little mistake or imperfection though?

So, now that the words are all in place, take a pen and just start tracing really hard around the letters. This will then leave an indentation on the wood. I didn't believe this at first, but it really works!

I then painted the words using two different colors of acrylic paint - black and tan. Another piece of advice... use a thin brush and don't drink a lot of coffee prior to doing this. You are going to need a steady hand! 

The next thing I did was take a piece of sandpaper and lightly go over all the words, edges, and any other place I wanted a distressed look. I also applied a little bit of Ralph Lauren's glaze over the areas I distressed. The next time I make one of these, I will use a glaze on all of it and distress it before transferring the words so that the entire piece of wood looks more aged instead of just certain areas. 

Ready for the final project...

I am so pleased with how this project turned out... even with my little imperfection.  I love that it is in a place where everyone can see and be reminded of the names of God.

Have a wonderful day!!!