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I've cracked the code, y'all! Make your own rustic farmhouse frames with some simple 1x3 pine and a staple gun. It's so simple you'll kick yourself for not thinking of it first!
Hi guys!! I’m back. It’s been a while. As recently as a week ago I honestly didn’t know if I would ever start blogging again. I didn’t ever plan to take a break, but here we are 8 months later, so . . . I guess I took a break. Life happens, situations change, and we all just do our best to adapt. We recently sent our daughter – our oldest and first to leave home – on an 18 month mission for our church in Tallahassee, Florida. Our second child is a senior in high school this year and will likely be leaving on his own church mission next summer. I work as a school nurse all day, err’ day. My husband and I work with the 10 and 11 year old children at church, and my house is a disaster, like all the time. I struggled for over a year to balance a full-time job, three teenage kids, my happy marriage, my faith, and the blog. Something had to give to save my sanity and the choice was obvious.
But I missed blogging. I missed it so much! I’ve continued to create things for my home. I’ll admit it has been nice to not stop and take step-by-step photos for tutorials, but still, a little bit of me always missed it. I’ve even kept a list of project ideas I wanted to share with y’all. Plus, I couldn't stand looking at those chocolate creme crepes on my home page for one more minute. So, I guess I’m back. But seriously, the turning point was when I completed one of my most recent projects and it turned out so good. Like, seriously, SO GOOD! And when I looked on Pinterest I didn’t really see anything else exactly like it, so I knew I HAD to share. It was a sign – literally and figuratively!!
I’ve been slowly updating our home to add some touches of my current obsession with quaint, modern farmhouse style, a la the iconic Joanna Gaines. I know, I know. Everyone is doing it right now. I don’t even care. I’m doing it, too, with my own little flavor added in. When I stripped and refinished my dining room furniture and hung new curtains this summer, I knew I needed new artwork to finish it off. I LOVED my old Living Christ and Family Proclamation printables, but they just weren’t quite working for me anymore.
I’m obsessed with old barn wood signs and chunky weathered wood frames. I have been wanting to try making my own for a while now, but it seemed overwhelming. I don’t own any fancy tools or have any woodworking skills. I am, however, naïve enough to think that I could “figure it out” with what I had on hand – a staple gun. And I’m happy to report that I did!! I knew I wanted something bigger and more substantial than the pictures I had hung before, so I designed new Family Proclamation and Living Christ printables in 16x20 size and bought canvases to match. (You can use any size you want, though. My example in the tutorial photos below is just a little 8x10 frame for a family portrait I drew. It will work the same way no matter what size you choose.) With just a few inexpensive materials and a simple $10 staple gun, I made my own chunky wood farmhouse framed signs and YOU CAN, TOO!!!
Easy Farmhouse Frame Tutorial
You will need:
a staple gun and staples
a framed canvas in the desired size
Mod Podge or double stick tape
1x3 pine boards (enough to cover the perimeter of your canvas plus several inches)
paint or stain
construction adhesive
printable art work (Get my 16x20 Living Christ and Family Proclamation printable here.)
Using Mod Podge or strong double stick tape, mount your printable to the canvas. Allow time to dry if you use Mod Podge. Also, if you use Mod Podge, I recommend using the matte finish as it is a little more rustic and natural looking than gloss finish.
Paint or stain your 1x3 pine boards to your desired color and allow to dry.
Cut 2 pieces of 1x3 pine board to fit the longer sides of your canvas. For my 8x10 example I cut 2 pieces, each 10” long. I used a miter saw, but I did not miter the corners. Just cut them straight. You could use a miter box and a hand saw or have your wood cut in the store when you buy it.
Attach the wood pieces to the canvas by applying a bead of construction adhesive down the side of the canvas, butting the wood right up against it, and securing with several staples in the back as shown. It won’t feel very secure at this point, but trust me!!
Place your canvas on top of a book or something solid that is just thick enough to make the back of the wood canvas frame sit flush with the 1x3 wood piece while you staple.
Next measure across the top of your picture from outside edge of the wood piece to outside edge of the opposite wood piece. (Measure more carefully than I am in the picture -- it's hard to take a picture with one hand and measure with the other!) Cut 2 pieces of 1x3 pine to this measurement. Paint or stain the cut edges of the pine board to match the rest of the frame and allow to dry.
Attach the top and bottom frame pieces in the same manner as you did the side pieces.
To firm everything up, add a couple of staples at each corner as shown above.
Allow the adhesive to dry and you’re finished!
It’s rustic with the exposed staples on the corners, but I kind of like that. It’s farmhouse-y. If the staples bother you, I think you could remove them once the adhesive has set up, but don’t quote me on that – I haven’t tried it. Now that I’ve “cracked the code” to making simple rustic farmhouse-y frames, I’m afraid my walls are going to be covered in them.
This little sign is one I made using a scrap piece of wood I had in my garage instead of a canvas. I also stenciled my design onto the wood instead of using a printable, but the framing was done in the same way as I showed you above.
Once you have it figured out, there is no end to what you can create with this technique. I already have a couple other signs in the works to share later – you’ll see!! What will you create with some 1x3’s and a staple gun??
