Dreaming of "Mon Jardin"

I studied French in high school, college, and graduate school, so it's always fun for me to throw some Francais around my home.  Combine the fact that I am DYING for Spring to chase away the last of Winter so I can get out in my garden....and you have my latest craft:  a handpainted "jardin" sign.

I already made a farmhouse sign from the reclaimed wood I got from a family barn in Georgia.  I used the smaller piece I cut last time for this project.

I painted on a smeary mix of brown and black acrylics to cover up the red.

It soaked into the grain beautifully. I almost wanted to leave it like this!

I applied a crackle medium, warm white paint, and then used an oak gel stain to further distress the corners of the wood.

The paint and crackle medium worked beautifull with the old wood.  For the letters, I used the same technique I did here and filled them in with "Tahiti Blue."

So to dispell the rest of winter's drear, I will dream of "mon jardin."

To see what parties I'm linking to, check my Blog Parties tab.  I'm also linking to:

This is also my first week of linking up at Sunday Showcase and Favorite Things Friday!

Reclaimed Wood Farmhouse Sign

Aren't there so many pretty handpainted sign projects out there?  I couldn't help but want to get in on it too!

Here is my rustic farmhouse sign....

When I was in Georgia over Christmas, I was able to salvage some wood from one of our old barns that is being renovated.  You can see it here!

The wood was painted red but you can still see the gorgeous grain.  It's already aged to perfection.

It was, however, a little too long, so I got out my NEW SAW (I'm so proud to officially own my very own saw), and took care of that.  Now I have another piece for a future project.

Since my heart will always be on the farm and this wood came from a farm, I thought it was only appropriate to paint "Farmhouse" on my sign.  I know there are better techniques out there for doing this, but this was my method: print out the words in Microsoft Word, placed them in the right position, like so...

Then I cut them out completely and sort of carved around each one to give myself an outline to paint in the letters.
It actually took quite a while to neatly and completely fill in the letters, but it was so worth it!

The look of the wood makes the sign so unique.

Now I have a sweet remembrance of home.

P.S. I'm linking this up to Sunday Showcase!  AND, Debbiedoo's awesome Newbie Party!  For the others parties I link to, see my blog parties tab!