DIY Pallet Art

For quite some time, I've been dying to make some art from a pallet!  I was talking about it one night and my husband said, "We have piles of pallets outside our shop...do you want one?"  Of course!  After bugging sweetly reminding him for a couple of weeks, he finally remembered to bring one home.  Yay!  

If you follow me on instagram (@itsjustlaine), you probably saw this picture.  I was jumping for joy when he brought it home!  But then the fun started...getting it apart was NOT easy.  We thought we could just use a crowbar but that was a big fail.  Because these pallets were quite old and weathered, the boards just kept cracking.  Thanks to Google, we came across this site with instructions to do it with a sawzall tool. That was the way to go!  Using the sawzall, my hubby had it apart in no time.

Next he put the pallet back together with the boards closer together, and then nailed three boards running vertically in the back for stability.  

While I may have had the inspiration for the project, my husband is most definitely the real brains behind it! He did all the math and drew the lines for the chevron.  (Basically he drew squares and then connected the corners to make the points...does that makes sense?)

Next he found an outline of the USA and printed it to the size I wanted and taped it together.  

 I cut it out, stuck some double sided tape on the underside and traced it onto the pallet. Whew, tracing it was not very easy....I had to push my pencil very hard to make a good line and boy did my hand get all crampy!

We left the map outline on there and only painted the chevron stripes around the USA. (Below is the instagram teaser pic!) 

 I don't have a picture of this either, but after we removed the paper map, we took tiny paint brushes and did the inside border of the USA with turquoise latex paint and then just filled in the rest using bigger brushes.  We only did one coat of paint so it would still have that "weathered look."

We all LOVE how it turned out!  It was well worth the effort. Having original art in our home that my hubby and I made together is so special! (Just like the family rules subway art we made a while back.)

Oh, and did I mention that it was FREE?  Free projects are always my favorite! ;)

 At first I didn't plan on putting it in the school room, but it is so perfect and looks awesome in there! This big ole' piece of pallet art makes the room feel bigger, it must be the horizontal chevron stripes.

 After looking at it for a few days, I decided it needed some pom-pom garland love.....=)

After making this piece of pallet art, I definitely want to do more!  Probably not as large, but there are plenty of ideas floating around in my head.  We already did another pallet project that I can't wait to share!  

Are you in love with the current "pallet" trend?  What would you make with a pallet?

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