Reclaimed Wood Ornaments & Homemade Stencils

I'm gearing up for another craft fair for this weekend and wanted to add a little Christmas color to my booth as well as a few "smalls."  These reclaimed wood ornaments were fairly easy to make. I honestly can't remember if these are from fence board or pallet planks or a combo of the two . Just dug out pieces from my scrap wood heap, washed and sanded them, then eyeballed the cuts into no particular size.

I used acrylic white paint for the base and a metallic acrylic in red for the candy cane stripes. Sealed with Mod Podge.










Homemade Stencils: 

Cardboard:

1. Printed off a candy cane pattern from the internet.
2. Securely tape the print out over the cardboard.
3. Slice along the pattern, essentially gives you two stencils, one of paper and one on the cardboard. The paper may tear a bit if your knife is dull.

I don't anticipate using this stencil often so the fact that it is made of cardboard won't matter too much. I have made stencils from cereal boxes in the past and have yet to have one fall apart on me, but these are always minimally used stencils.

Lampshade Styrene:

The nativity and reindeer though are sliced into an old lampshade found in a "treasure hunt," it had a small hole punched into one side but the rest was usable real estate.

1. Print out design onto paper.
2. On these stencils I cut the pattern out of the paper first with the exacto knife so I have a paper stencil.
3. Then, traced the stencil design onto the styrene with a sharpie.
4. Cut along the sharpie line with the exacto knife.

I recommend using a very sharp exacto knife for this approach. The lampshade styrene is very thick and took f.o.r.e.v.e.r to cut through, but now I have durable, long-lasting stencils that I know I will use for other projects. A plus to using the styrene stencil over a cardboard stencil is that you don't have to wait for it to dry before stenciling more pieces. I'm more cautious with my cereal box stencils so the paint doesn't saturate and cause tears.

I just love the knots and hole in this piece. So much character.  And that rusty coil hanger! ~love~

For a more subdued and rustic look I layered a couple reds and added twine. See the coil hangers on top? Taken from a rusty crib mattress, just perfect for this project!

This one is a hybrid between the two designs that I'm keeping for myself.