So, I go on Pinterest and see these amazing large letters with big, bright lights in them. I don't know why, but I have been totally drawn to them. They look fun and I LOVE personalized stuff - like initials and such. I have them all over my house - just ask my friends! I found that there were a few tutorials on how to make them and I told my husband that I was SURE this would be seriously easy by doing a little of this and a little of that and we'd have this thing done! He actually liked my idea of the marquee, which usually takes me some convincing whenever we have a project that I dream up. Well, last week...
...I shared our command center and how well it's working for our family! Today I want to show you how we made the lighted marquee "B" that we use to light up that corner of the command center.
I wanted this to be inexpensive. Did you know that these marquee letters cost about $150-250 on Etsy and other online websites? I printed off a letter "B" using PicMonkey. But, I could only get half the letter for that large of a size on a piece of paper. So, I just flipped it upside down for the bottom half of it and traced it. {Sometimes I'm smart, but not always}.
We took a piece of 8 x 2 board to use for the marquee that we had in our garage. My hubby, after I traced the letter, used the jigsaw and cut it out. I could certainly have done that myself, but I'll be honest and say he's MUCH better at it than I am.
We measured, very carefully, for the lights to fit through the board. We used tea lights , that I had here, and set them on there to kind of get a good idea how it would look and exactly the best placement - I'm more of an eye-baller, and my hubby is the measuring man, so this worked great to get it right.
After that, we drilled all the holes. Then, came the hard part. This is where I didn't take so many pictures as it took a bit more work. We took metal flashing - from Home Depot - and put it all around the sides so that the sign stood out - about half way. We used an electric staple gun and stapled it to the board. After we did that I spray painted with primer.
You can see, from this collage above, the step by steps. We used a simple strand of Christmas lights and used round bulbs instead of the regular shaped ones. We also took off all the extra lights - you can do that without any problem. I stapled the strands {as neatly as possible} to the back of the wood and then bought a hanging kit on the back to hang from a couple of command hooks on the wall. It looks great and it's a lot of fun. My hubby installed a small switch on to the cord so we can switch it off and on easily.
Here's the list of supplies we used:
And that's it! Have you ever had a project that seemed easy but was actually a bit harder than expected? Well, this project took the two of us several hours...yes! But, it was fun to do it with my hubby, for the most part!
...I shared our command center and how well it's working for our family! Today I want to show you how we made the lighted marquee "B" that we use to light up that corner of the command center.
I wanted this to be inexpensive. Did you know that these marquee letters cost about $150-250 on Etsy and other online websites? I printed off a letter "B" using PicMonkey. But, I could only get half the letter for that large of a size on a piece of paper. So, I just flipped it upside down for the bottom half of it and traced it. {Sometimes I'm smart, but not always}.
We took a piece of 8 x 2 board to use for the marquee that we had in our garage. My hubby, after I traced the letter, used the jigsaw and cut it out. I could certainly have done that myself, but I'll be honest and say he's MUCH better at it than I am.
We measured, very carefully, for the lights to fit through the board. We used tea lights , that I had here, and set them on there to kind of get a good idea how it would look and exactly the best placement - I'm more of an eye-baller, and my hubby is the measuring man, so this worked great to get it right.
After that, we drilled all the holes. Then, came the hard part. This is where I didn't take so many pictures as it took a bit more work. We took metal flashing - from Home Depot - and put it all around the sides so that the sign stood out - about half way. We used an electric staple gun and stapled it to the board. After we did that I spray painted with primer.
You can see, from this collage above, the step by steps. We used a simple strand of Christmas lights and used round bulbs instead of the regular shaped ones. We also took off all the extra lights - you can do that without any problem. I stapled the strands {as neatly as possible} to the back of the wood and then bought a hanging kit on the back to hang from a couple of command hooks on the wall. It looks great and it's a lot of fun. My hubby installed a small switch on to the cord so we can switch it off and on easily.
Here's the list of supplies we used:
- 8 x 2 piece of scrap wood
- Paper with letter B to trace
- Jigsaw for cutting letter out
- Drill and forstner bit {to make large holes}
- Strand of old Christmas light with round bulbs
- Flashing
- Staples and staple gun
- Spray primer and paint
- Switch to turn off and on
And that's it! Have you ever had a project that seemed easy but was actually a bit harder than expected? Well, this project took the two of us several hours...yes! But, it was fun to do it with my hubby, for the most part!
P.S. Do you need any ideas for Mother's Day for a gift for yourself or your own mother? I have them right HERE!
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