How to: Wooden Arrow Wall Decor

Rob and I wanted Baby Rebhan's nursery to be perfect. We looked at lots of pictures and decided on certain elements we liked. We chose to make whatever we could instead of buying. It was fun to create items from simply looking at a picture and we saved lots of money doing it that way! 

One of my favorite elements in the nursery is the wooden arrow decal above our son's crib. It was a simple project that we finished in one day and it makes a big statement! 

Here is a step by step of how we completed this simple project!! 

1. GETTING SUPPLIES: We went to Home Depot to buy the wood, metal plates, screws, and brackets to hang our finished product.

For three arrows:

   - Wood: 2 Poplar 1x5 boards (6 feet each)

   - 3 L-shaped Metal Plates

   - 1inch screws

   - 3 picture hanging toothed brackets 

2. MAKING THE CUTS: We cut each board into 6 individual sections. We saved wood by making angled cuts instead of later trimming rectangles. The first cut should start at the bottom corner of the board while it's laying flat on your saw; cut a 45 degree angle off the end. You'll end up with a small triangle falling off the full board. The rest of the cuts should be measured from the bottom of the board, we chose to use 10 inch increments. The image below is a representation of the first segment only, imagine the board extending to the right (another small triangle will fall off the far end too). 

3. SANDING: After cutting the boards (see all the extra triangles in the photo below!), we sanded them so there were no rough edges from the cutting. We didn't spend a lot of time making the boards perfect because no one would ever touch them. We just made sure there were no frayed ends!

4. STAINING: After wiping any remaining sanding dust off the boards, I used old rags to apply Minwax Wood Stain in Special Walnut 224. Fortunately, we had this stain lying around the house (I had bought it for a previous project but ended up using another color). I like to use rags because the stain goes on in a thin layer verses using foam brushes and having to wipe off the access later. I also like it because you can see the result immediately. I ended up using two coats, I thought about three but figured it would be too dark compared to the other wooden elements in the nursery. We chose not to seal the arrows because, again, no one was going to be touching them and they wouldn't ever be exposed to high amounts of moisture (read water rings). 

   

5. ASSEMBLY: After all the boards were dry I matched them up in groups of four that fit best together. Even though they are all cut the same, there is always some human error. Once they were matched, I was able to pick which side of each board I liked the best. Because some have knots and some don't the stain is a little different on each piece. After I decided what pieces went best together, I laid the arrow face down and lined up the metal plate. I decided to put the screws in with a screwdriver instead of an electric drill with just a little (wo)man power! I was worried that the electric drill would split the wood and I didn't want to have to start over! Once the arrows were whole, I attached my hooks. I found that the "center" of the arrow was above the top corner of the metal bracket and that's where I nailed in the hooks (not pictured).  

6. HANG IT UP! It's as simple as that, hang on desired wall and enjoy!! 

I hope this can inspire you to create your own version of something you found online! It can be fun to create without guidelines but if you need them, here they are! Please let us know if you have any questions by commenting here or emailing us. As always, ENJOY and show us what you come up with!! 

feeling pinspired

I always have a lot of projects rolling around in my brain, sketched out in some book, pinned on pinterest, etc. and because there are so many, I have to decide which ones are necessary.

I would love to do all the projects that I think of or find, but the reality is once you finish the project, you have to have a place for it. Well, our small house doesn't allow for much "extra" without looking ultimately more cluttered than decorated; it's a fine fine line!

When we first moved into the house we had a garage sale that was a joint effort between us, my mom, Rob's mom and my aunt. At the end of the sale I collected a couple pieces that I thought I could repurpose into other things (these Christmas trees were one of the things I gained). Another was a frame with a print of three peppers, a little dated but intriguing to me, so I snagged it! 

Originally, I was going to use this frame to create a dry erase calendar for the kitchen but as I was painting, I decided that I didn't want there to be a white background as a part of the calendar and so I decided to set it aside. 

   

I did go ahead and paint the whole frame black so that I could use it for a project in the future. I switched to a different floating frame that I wasn't able to use anywhere else in the house for my calendar idea. I used the same aqua cards, pictured above, to make the date squares - the pinterest idea suggested paint chips for an ombre affect but I thought that would look too busy. Because of the frame size I went with 1.5inch x 1.75 inch rectangles and I was able to get six from each card. 

   

After placing all the cut out rectangles on the glass with rolls of scotch tape, I simply put the frame back together. I didn't add all the dates because they change every month and I didn't want to have to take apart the frame every month. Dry erase markers, which was my idea from the beginning worked out perfectly. 

   

With such clean lines it adds nicely to the kitchen without adding clutter to the walls! Last year our calendar hung on the fridge with magnets so I wanted to put it somewhere near it's old location, hence the wall next to the refrigerator. 

Project one, complete!

Once I finished the calendar, I went back to the pepper print. I still liked it and thought it was interesting, it just needed some modernization. I first used an Xacto knife to remove the green matting. 

      

Removing the matting made a great difference but the print itself still looked quite dull. I decided to try my hand at adding some contrast to the image with a black ink pen. I simply followed along all the original lines with the pen to really make the print look modern and far more updated than before. 

I think that the black outlines did wonders for the print and made it good looking enough to live in our kitchen! The corner that I placed it in was one that I was never settled on before, thinking that something was always missing. I think this nice graphic of peppers is just was the doctor decorator ordered! 

Overall, these projects cost me... NOTHING. It was a free crafting day at the Rebhan house and I was so happy to be able to not only repurpose one item, but two for our kitchen! 

Pinterest is a wonderful thing and I like it even more when I can create something that I find without having to spend one single cent! Always a win in my book. 

Thanks for following along, we are tackling some fun projects coming up so stay tuned! 

Until next time,

Lindsey