This past weekend I attended a baby shower for a dear friend of mine. We first became friends more than 8 years ago when we bravely jumped out of an airplane together in a crazy teenage state of mind. She's now married and expecting her first child, a little girl who'll be named Lily, and I couldn't be happier for her.
I wanted to give Lily something that was heart felt and homemade -- I truly think those are the best gifts, so I made her a similar version of a cute quote from a popular children's song I saw in a kid's store a few months back. I put my own spin on it and liked mine even more than the one for sale in the store for around $50. (I won't say exactly how much I spent, but let's just say it was far less than that).
I started with an old canvas I scored at a thrift store a while back, and had intentions to paint over it, but the surface was rough (due to the thickness of the existing oil paint) so I just grabbed some leftover drop cloth from a previous project, cut it to size and stapled it in place firmly around the canvas.
Next, I laid out the letters in an arrangement I liked and started painting them in with purple, Lily's main nursery color. You'll want to be careful not to put too much paint on your brush as paint tends to clump underneath the stencil letters causing blots rather than neat letters, so use a small amount of paint and apply a few coats until you achieve even coverage.
Once I was finished with all of the letters, which took quite some time, so you'll need patience for this project, I decided to add nailhead trim to the corners in silver (Lily's other nursery color). And because I felt it needed a little more pizazz, I also decorated two of the words with nailhead trim. Unfortunately Home Depot ran out of trim before I had enough to finish the project, so I'll just stop by one night next week to quickly finish up. The words "Happy" and "Clap" will be adorned with nail trim.
I hope this is something for Lily that encourages creativity and makes her happy for years to come. I'm so excited to meet this sweet girl soon!
Thank you for the creative and adorable painting. Dave and I love it! It means a lot to have such a fun and thoughtful piece hanging in Lily's nursery! It makes me happy every time I look at it, especially knowing it was created by such a great friend! Thanks again, Kim
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