"Dairy" Farmhouse Sign

Another good find at a local estate sale led to this sign being made.  It would have been finished sooner except I was nursing my seven year old daughter after she fell a short distance from a tree and ended up with several stitches in her thigh.  She was a trooper though while I kept bordering on the edge of passing out nearly everytime I had to look at her wound.

This is why I paint and am NOT a nurse.  

I loved the tray for it's crate box look and since our other "bed" tray hit the floor one day and split in two, I need another one.

I gave her one good coat, spread out well, of ASCP in Chateau Grey.  I made areas here and there a bit heavier as vintage/antique items rarely have a "uniform" paint job when you find them.  Next, I picked a font from my Photoshop tool box and sized my letter to meet the height and width of the tray.  I choose to print them out individually and then line them up on the tray.  I then took my graphite transfer paper and "traced" each letter onto the top of the tray.

As you can see, there will be shadows on the "Dairy" word, so I start painting all the letters in ASCP in Old White first.

For the fine and thin areas of some letters more of a trace than an actual paint brush, I use Sharpee oil-based paint pen in white.  These are a lifesaver for these hard-to-paint areas.

All thats left to do is paint in the shadowing.

For the shadowing, I mixed one tablespoon of ASCP in Graphite with 1/4 teaspoon of Paris Grey.  I wanted a more faded "black" on that part.    

In some of the thin areas, I took a thin, yet wide paintbrush and dabbed the paint in lightly as oppose to using brush strokes.

It gives me more control without going over my lines.

Now it's ready for a little distressing!

I give her a light distressing with a fine sandpaper block (I just love these things!):

Finally, a thin coat of dark wax is put over the whole piece.  

Some areas get a little more wax than others though.

After waxing, go over it with a soft cloth to buff.

Now she's ready to hand in my kitchen up against our brick wall!

She looks a little farmhouse-y!

Vintage Resurrections