I’ve been enjoying every second of summer vacation and have been crafting up a storm! I’ve seen rustic style pallet signs around the ‘interweb’ for a while and decided that with my trusty Silhouette Portrait machine, along with some wood from shipping pallets found in my mom’s warehouse (she owns a wholesale yarn company), creating one of my own was feasible!
After I had pried apart the slats from the pallets using a crowbar, I started by laying out the wood (I used 7 pieces) to see how they would best fit together. Then I flipped the pieces over so I could secure them together using $.98 yard sticks found at Home Depot. I cut each yard stick in half and used really short nails to secure 4 pieces of ruler across the backs of the slats.
After my ‘ruler braces’ were secure, I used a handsaw to cut the boards on both ends to even things out. The sign can be as large or small as you’d like…the number of boards you use and length you cut your boards is totally customizable!
Once the sign is constructed, next comes the fun part: designing your wording! I decided to use one of my favorite paraphrased quotes of Barney Stinson from How I Met Your Mother…
Cutting the letters was SUPER easy using my Silhouette machine! I used Silhouette vinyl for the letter templates (font is Arial Bold). To ensure my letter placement was correct, I used painters tape to act as guides. Then I used the scraper tool that comes with the Silhouette machine to ensure that each letter was FIRMLY pressed down. Because I was sticking the letters on bare wood, they tended to not want to stick…so press firmly! Then, take your sign outside and mist with a light coating of spray paint. Gently peel each letter away and your left with a fun, rustic, one of a kind sign!
I was actually intending for this sign to go in my classroom but I loved the finished product so much that I decided it had to hang on my wall at home! Perhaps before summer’s end, I will make a second sign to take to school!
