Paint Me Plaid

By: Holli Long (Visit Holli’s blog, )

Coming home to California after living in Georgia for 23 years has been quite an adjustment!  To say the least.  But, I do love it.  It’s like moving back to Paradise, the weather, the people, the city, the beach….well, it’s just been wonderful.  So, I made this little plaque to celebrate the way I feel day in and day out.

I thought it would be a great idea to work some of the Folk Art Stains into this project.  The Stains, like so many of Plaid’s products, are so easy to use and look absolutely beautiful!  I gathered a wood plaque, some natural beachy colors of Folk Art Acrylics, and two colors of Stains to make this statement!

I first stained the entire plaque with the White Stain.  So easy to do, I just used a foam brush to apply the stain and then waited half a minute before I used a clean, dry cloth to wipe away the extra. I taped off a large stripe down the center of my plaque, and added two smaller stripes out to the sides of the center stripe to look a little like an old fashioned surf board.  Then, I brushed the Heartland Blue Stain over the entire project, waited a bit, and wiped until I really liked the color of my plaque.

I went to my Microsoft Word program to find a cool font to make my pattern for the words that I wanted to paint on the plaque, printed it off, and transferred the pattern easily to the center of the plaque.

Then, I watered down Licorice paint and, with a liner brush, painted in the words.  I also painted the outside edge of the plaque Thunder Blue and sanded it a little after it was completely dry.

I freehanded a little sand-line at the bottom of my plaque with Clay Bisque.  To make the rises in the sand, I loaded my brush with water and side loaded it into the Raw Sienna.

Then, I watered down a bit of Forest Moss and Sap Green, and with my liner brush again, I added some grassy areas and dotted in some moss near the rise of the sand.  And, I dotted little Raw Sienna and Wicker White flowers on top of some of the grass.

I then took an old, stiff stencil brush and loaded it with some watered down Raw Sienna to flick across the sand to give it a little more dimension.  This is an easy process, but a messy one!    I love that!

I gathered some jute and made sure it was long enough for a hanger for my plaque and tied a knot in the center, and two knots at the end of the hanger.  I used hot glue to secure the hanger to the back of the plaque.

I also hot glue a few shells to the bottom, in the “sand”, and one at the top of the hanger!

This was a fun project to complete for me and will look beautiful in my living room.  For me, the sentiment rings so true!

Supplies you will need to make this project:

Folk Art Acrylic Paints

452         Raw Sienna

458         Sap Green

527         Forest Moss

601         Clay Bisque

609         Thunder Blue

901         Wicker White

938         Licorice

945         Maple Syrup

Folk Art Stains

2800       White

2808       Heartland Blue

Large flat brush, liner brush, #10 flat brush, stiff bristle stencil brush, sandpaper, transfer paper, pencil, 3/4″ painters tape, 1/4″ grout tape, hot glue, assorted sea shells, jute