Tutorial for Easy Name Wall Art (If Your Child Has a Short Name)

So I bought the stuff to do this simple project months and months ago. It took me going to a craft night at a friend's house to finally do it. The letters were given to me at one of my showers. They were on a diaper cake. The inspiration for this project was the name wall art featured here. However, I knew I didn't want to put that many nails in the wall for each individual letter. Since I scrapbook (or did in a former life), I decided to use paper instead. Unfortunately, this won't really work if your child has a long name. However, if you want to try it, long and skinny frames do exist, and you would need to get rather large paper for the project to avoid seams. You could also just do a short word, such as Love.

Materials:
wooden letters (Mine were given to me, but you can find lots of wooden letters for sale on the internet (try Etsy), in a store, or if you have a pal who's handy with a jigsaw and can make them.)
picture frame (I used a very cheap 8X10 frame)
scrapbook paper (one 8.5X11 sheet for the background, plus sheets in whatever colors you want to use for the circles)
circle paper punches in 2 sizes (I used a Creative Memories circle punch with 2 sizes: 1 1/2 and 1 1/4 inch)
paper trimmer
glue stick
hot glue gun
acrylic paint
paint brush  


Step 1: Paint your letters with acrylic paint and let dry. Drying doesn't take very long. Do more than one coat if needed.

I used an old Relevent magazine for my paint. I apologize for the big ole S-word!

Step 2: Trim your 8.5X11 paper down to fit the 8X10 frame. Thankfully I bought more than one sheet of paper, because I trimmed off too much the first time!

Step 3: Punch out your circles and glue them together to get the layered look. Of course, you can use other shapes, other pictures, or skip this altogether if you just want the name. I think stripes would be super cute too (use your paper trimmer to make those!).

Step 4: Lay out your circles on the paper and glue them down. Now you have a good guide to use when placing the letters.

Step 5: Lay out your wooden letters where you want them to be and use hot glue to glue them down.

Step 6: Place it in the frame. Put the glass behind your art to fill up space and keep it handy if you decide you want to use it as a regular frame one day.

The green looks a little off, but the colors are white, brown, aqua, and lime green.

You're done! SO easy. It took about an hour, and that includes paint drying and chatting time.