An easy DIY Wedding Gift

As I mentioned yesterday, I recently attended my cousin's wedding. It was so beautifully decorated and every detail was thoughtfully planned. I suspect this is what weddings in the "Pinterest era" will be like for a while. My friend got married last November, and it was equally elaborate, with fun details, great ways to make and preserve memories, and details that really spoke to the bride and groom.
As a Pinterest osbsessionista, I was bound to make at least part of my cousin's wedding gift by hand. A few weeks before her wedding, I stumbled onto this idea: http://www.shanty-2-chic.com/2013/05/free-printable.html
That's a free printable that says: "In our Home let love abide, and Bless all those who step inside"
I just thought that was the perfect phrase to have up in your new home as husband and wife, so I got to work. The idea on the website was to frame it in a handmade frame. When I saw the power tools involved, I decided to take an alternate route.
So, here's what I did:
Went to Hobby Lobby and got an unfinished wooden plaque, upolstry tacks, a set of sawtooth picture hangers, and one sheet of white cardstock. Total cost: $7.47 (though I have 44 tacks left, and 2 extra hangers)
Here's what I started with:

Sorry-forgot to take a photo with the hanger that goes on the back, but I'll show you that below.

Let me share my first lesson learned with this project: don't start the day before you need it. I used a special process for staining the unfinished wood where you use vinegar and steel wool. It's easy, and the result was beautiful, but you have to let the vinegar and steel wool soak in a glass jar for 24 hours, which I discovered exactly 24 hours before I needed this project to be done. I had looked at lots of tutorials online to use this steel wool and vinegar technique (too late of course) and theirs all looked pretty brown and muddy after the 24 hours. Mine looked like white vinegar with a glob of steel wool floating in it after 23 hours, so I started to panic. I read one idea where the person had used tea to also stain before using the steel wool, so I made a batch of tea. And prayed. The praying must have worked, as you'll see below.

After I rounded everything else up, I got to work on printing the printable (see website above for your very own). My printer has been misbehaving lately, so printing ONE sheet took about 20 minutes, but it came out perfect! The printed image looks like a chalkboard, which is a sweet effect. So while that was working (or hardly working), I made the tea and started frantically staining the wood with tea. This is what it looked like after 2 coats. So, basically, like I had done nothing.

 

I decided to take my chances with the steel wool even though it looked pretty useless. You can kind of see it in the background below here floating in the mason jar. Lesson number 2: To my total shock, as I rubbed the steel wool directly onto the wood, it stained it! It is a lovely grayish brown that looks aged, rather than simply finished. So, even if the vinegar doesn't turn dark, the steel wool will still stain. This was the first coat:

Lesson number 3: As you can see, I stained the concrete below. Oops! I suppose mostly because I didn't think it was going to work, I neither put down newspaper nor put on gloves:

I would highly recommend both. Fortunately, I was able to cover my nasty stained fingernails with a nice coat of coral nail polish. This was after a second and final coat:

Of note, the stain stinks like vinegar, but I didn't find it unbearable. I worked outside, and since this was a small project (my little plaque was 8 x 10) it only took moments to put on each coat, and each coat dried almost instantly. Next, I attached the picture hanger to the back (sorry for the blurry picture):

Then, I cut down the printed image. Lesson number 4: I did what you should never do: I didn't measure the plaque before I printed the phrase, so I had to mash it down and make it work. If I'd measured, I would have realized the surface was actually 7.5 x 9.5 and I'd have to trim a bit. To attach the photo, I measured a half inch in from the top and side of each corner, then placed an upolstry tack and pressed it as far as I could by hand. I placed all the tacks, checked to see that it looked right, then hammered them gently the rest of the way in.





Here's the finished product:

And, next to the front door (i.e., out of the blaring midday sun)

 

And Lesson number 5: Wait a few days and let the vinegar air out before gifting. You could smell the vinegar through the wrapping paper! Oh, well.

 

Altogether, not including the wait time to "cure" the steel wool in the vinegar, this project took less than an hour, including waiting between coats. I would highly recommend you also check out this post from the same blogger which has additional similar ideas: http://www.shanty-2-chic.com/2013/04/mothers-day-gift-free-printable.html