Family Blocks

This project "accidentally" started when I went down into the wood shop to clean up and got a little distracted (this is nothing new for me).  I started picking up all of the scrap pieces of wood that were littering the shop and my first thought was "these things have got to go"....but then I thought "I could TOTALLY make something with these...".  This is how a lot of my projects begin.  I don't want to just throw away something I could use, so I make something to prove that I have a reason to keep the item...even if there are hundreds of them!

So I picked out a word I wanted to spell.  My first thought was the spell out our last name but I went with the word "family" instead so that I could later sell this at one of my craft shows if I wanted to.  I grabbed enough pieces to spell my chosen word and trimmed up a couple pieces (I didn't want any to be the same size).

I started by painting the sides and fronts a dark brown.  Since this was intended to hang on a wall, I didn't see a point in painting the back.

After painting them brown I decided that this was WAY too boring for me.  So I decided to add some color.  Next I painted the sides a turquoise color (which I LOVE).

I knew that I wanted to distress these blocks...so I didn't mind that the brown showed through the turquoise a little bit.  Once the paint was dry I went outside and distressed them with my mouse sander and this was the result:

My original idea was to add vinyl letters to the blocks but once I distressed them I knew that I need to use paint and stencils so that I could distress the letters as well...it would just look better.

So my next step was to cut stencils using my Silhouette Cameo and contact paper.

Once the cream paint for the lettering was dry I took the blocks back outside to sand again.  I love how the distressed look turned out...it was definitely a better choice.

Next it was time to assemble the blocks.  I took them back down to the wood shop where this all began.  I decided to line them up across the bottom so the it would look nice hung over a framed family photo.  Once I had them lined up I turned them over to glue and staple a thin piece of wood to the back.  I also used wire to make a hanger.

Then it was all done and ready to hang.  This was a simple and quick project I did in a couple of hours.  I think I may make ones with my boys names to put up in their rooms!