Welcome House Name Signs

Welcome Family House Name Signs

Dress up the Front Porch/Entry Way!

I visited a friends brand spankin' new house recently that she some how magically Mary Poppins style decorated in no time to perfection!  I really wonder if she had a magic bottomless bag full of cute decor and just sang and danced as it all came into place in a day! I'm too indecisive, frugal and DIY-er to get my house together that fast, and too ADD to notice that things are still not done...but her home did inspire me.  I fell in love with her custom family house name sign on her front porch and wanted to make my own.  I did a little research to find out what I liked and then made a mashup of a couple styles of family name signs put together.

My inspiration were these

 

By Longfellowdesigns on Etsy

And this gem I found on google image search by Mango Seed Designs...I cannot for the life of me find this again to post the link as I had saved the pic on my phone...

So anyways, Here is mine

I had an old canvas with a hideous reddish purple-y abtsract painting I had started long ago...I brushed on some turquoise craft paint and once that dried, I lightly sanded it so some of the darker colors underneath would show through.  Then Free handed the rest so yes it's imperfect, but isn't the the beauty of homemade/handmade items?  Not perfect!  At least at my house!  Anyways, I'm excited to finally not have a naked front porch!

I really like the chalkboard style welcome family name signs, but since I didn't have any black paint on hand and love turquoise I decided to make it a turquoise welcome house sign!  And being frugal, those bales of hay are dual purpose, it's future fresh hay for the chicken coop!  I can't believe it's like $8 or more for those tiny little decorative bales of hay when you can go to the feed store and get actual bales of hay for like $5!  Now...looking at this picture I just remembered I better go water those mums!  And...I guess I can take down the spider now that Halloween is over!

Hand Painted Family Last Name Signs

Now that they have been recieved...I can show and tell these gifts I made!

Hand painted family last name signs with the date each family established on 12 x 12 inch canvas.   I found a really fine tip paint brush and some Japanese Sumi Ink in my stash that worked out really well for doing all the lettering.  I used the same technique as I did in the Restoration Hardware Inspired Pillows Tutorial.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas!  We missed being with family but it was still special having our first Christmas here in our new house and of course....Christmas is special wherever you are because no matter where you are and who you are with, it's all about Christ! And we have been blessed to have met so many wonderful friends since we moved here in May so we have yet to be lonely on the holidays and had a amazing Christmas Eve Dinner with Friends and attended an awesome service, everything was wonderful. On Christmas Day, I meant to make a yummy gluten free chocolate layered cake, but we all ended up taking a long nap on Christmas day which resulted with an overcooked Turkey and some last minute mashed potatoes and steamed peas! lol...and Luckily we already had an awesome meal the night before  also lucky I had this one cupcake in the freezer that the kids could share!





PS- Thanks everyone who has been voting for my embarrassing moments stories over at Wanna Be Balanced!  My skin has been SO terrible lately so I am really hoping to win the microdermabrasion kit!  If you haven't seen the post yet with all the funny stories and voted yet, check it out HERE.  Scroll down to the post titled "Vote for Your Favorite" and I'm number 10.  You may have already read about this on my facebook or twitter but I didn't want to miss anyone knowing about it :)