Painted Lighted Canvas

Greetings everyone! Have you’ve seen some of the wonderful lighted signage that seem to be popping up  in the stores?  I did a New Year’s Eve post for Tiny Prints blog (that will be posted this weekend) , and, as part of the decor for the post, I made this painted lighted canvas for our mantel.

I chose the word SPARKLE which I thought was so fitting for the holidays and especially New Year’s Eve.

I thought a lighted canvas would freshen up the look of the mantel and add a little glitz!

They are fairly easy to make and don’t take to much time.  The result is so pretty, I think:)

If you’d like to give it a try it only takes a few items and about an hour or so.

1. You’ll need a canvas. (decide how big you’d like yours to be. I purchased mine at the art supply store, which has a huge selection of sizes.

2. Choose a paint brush that will be the width of your lettering.

3. Gold acrylic paint.

4. Watercolor pencil. (This is important. Do NOT use a lead pencil because it will muddy up your letters when you paint them. The watercolor pencil is great because if you make a mistake  just dampen a cloth and wipe it away.

Now, you can be as creative as you want here. Either free hand your lettering or photo copy your word using the font you like. Enlarge it to your desired size and transfer it to the canvas. I printed off the word SPARKLE and free-handed mine onto the canvas.

Take your time painting over the letters. It took 2 coats of paint to get the color I was looking for.

After it dries, hold the canvas  up to the light to decide where you want to poke holes for the lights.

I used a strand of 100 soft white mini lights. (you can use battery operated lights if your prefer) I’ve seen them at Target. I used the plug in ones simply because I had them on hand and I have an outlet on my mantel.

To poke the holes in the canvas I used a very sharp pointy scissors. ( Actually I used my manicure scissors. They worked perfectly.) Be careful to only make the holes large enough to push the light through and snug enough to hold the light in place.

For the Christmas season, I used my gold reindeer and silver glittered tree. For New Year’s just change out the reindeer for the champagne glasses. There you have it.

Hope you like it as much as I do and that you’ll give it a try. CHEERS!

I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Be sure to come back over the weekend to check out my post on Tiny Prints blog. Thanks and feel free to pin away.

Thank You Tip Junkie for featuring me.

Linked to Bloom. and I Heart Naptime   

and Skip to My Lou

and Tip Junkie