American Flag Pallet Art

If you are on Pinterest, you've probably seen lots of projects lately that involve wood pallets. 

I sure have seen a lot!  And what a great idea to repurpose pallets.  They are cheap (or free) and easy to come by! With the 4th of July quickly approaching, I wanted to try the American flag art idea I have been seeing.  I put my own touch to it and I really like how it turned out!

Before

I started by telling my father that I wanted a pallet.  He thought I was nuts and with raised eyebrows, reluctantly agreed to deliver one to my house!

I began by using Krylon spray paints in red, white, and blue (of course!) I did not measure anything or draw lines or doing any prep work at all. (I'm sort of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kinda gal!)

I first painted the red stripes on the flag.  I gave it two coats of paint and loved how the rough, rustic look of the wood still shown through the paint.  After the red stripes, I added the blue section for the stars.  You can see the blue extends just beyond the second row of nails.  That was my way of measuring.

I then gave it two coats of white paint for the white stripes.

I used Plaid brand stencils that I got at Walmart to paint on little white stars all over the blue.

I added them randomly just here and there with some half on/half off the boards.

I put scrap paper underneath to protect what I wasn't intending to paint.

Recently someone dropped off a big box of these plastic letters to me in my classroom.  They have little pokey tacks on the back like thumb tacks!  I knew they'd be perfect for what I had in mind. 

I stuck the letters into styrofoam and spray painted them blue.

I then added the blue letters just by gently pushing the tacks into the pallet boards. 

 I am very pleased with how it turned out.  What a great Independence Day decoration for my porch!  My father was surprised and impressed with the transformation his old pallet took on!  I have already asked my dad to send over the next pallet.  I'm ready to try something new!