This project has so many of my favorite components. I love color, paint, process art, functionality, and several steps for a project and this fun project incorporates all of that.
It’s not too difficult and a few steps can really set up kids or you for a fun project that (I believe) you would then enjoy the finished product for years. Embrace the process being the art and enjoy it with this project.
I will quickly show you the main steps I did in this project with campers at our studio. My purpose is to inspire you to embrace color and to maybe try parts of this project to make it your own. You can change the measurements, techniques and tips to create a fun piece that works for you!
1. Build
As I was dreaming up this project for my campers, I used a mix of donated wood and bought supplies to create a basic tray. I started by trimming plywood pieces with my Miter Saw and Brad Nailer to create small wood tray. The frame for my tray was approximately 13″ x 8.5″.
2. Sand and Prime
I wanted my campers to focus on the wood squares that went IN their tray, so I prepped the tray a bit more for them. I sanded the trays and primed them white, so my artists could spend more time enjoying painting the wood squares.
3. Paint squares & Tray
I built my wood trays to be able to hold (6) 4″ x 4″ wood squares. You can build your tray to hold whatever size tray you want. Or you can skip adding the wood squares and just paint the bottom of your tray any of these fun ways.
I pulled out a mix of different materials to allow my campers to paint their squares in an abstract, fun way. In this step, we focused on the process of creating, experimenting, playing, observing, pivoting to enjoy painting without a paintbrush.
The techniques we encouraged were:
- Painting with pipettes and watered-down paint. You can read a post all about this technique here. This technique creates a marbled-paint pour that is a super fun look.
- Scrape painting with an old giftcard or hotel key. In this technique, you move the paint around with the key and the focus is on play. Depending on how hard or light you press the key down you can blend colors and show movement with creating ripples.
- Fun tools like feathers, forks, cooking basters, and tooth picks all can add fun stamping or blending in paint. You can’t fully control your image with these tools, which forces you to play and discover.
I planed to allow my campers to use a paintbrush to paint their wood trays, after they painted their wood squares.
I imagined the squares fun and abstract and then the tray being where they could practice “controlling” their finished product a little bit more.
I was so surprised (and excited!) to see that the campers had so much fun exploring the fun tools and paint techniques that most of them choose to paint their tray in the same way!
4. Dry and Spray Sealer
After everything was painted, we let it dry overnight. Because of the thick layer of paint, it took longer to dry. Once everything was dry, I used Rustoleum’s Clear Gloss spray to completely cover the art. This sealed their masterpieces, added a protective layer, and helped some of those blended colors pop a bit more.
5. Final details- Glue squares and add handles
It was fun to encourage the artists to play designer on how they would like their squares to lay in their wood tray. Once they figured out the order they wanted them to go in, they used wood glue to put the squares in place inside the wood tray.
They were gorgeous! I added the handles to complete the trays and were ready to be taken home and stylized!
Each tray turned out so different, yet beautiful and colorful. I love the mix of color, wood, and metal handles.
The squares allow the wood tray to have fun different colors all mixed together. Any one of the wood squares might not be loved if taken out and used on its own. Yet, when the wood squares are paired together with other fun squares they look stunning and make one another even more fun.
I love how I had some ideas for the main parts/steps of this project, but it was open ended enough that the campers could play and personalize it to their own taste. I never mentioned splatter painting, yet the girls did play with that technique.
It always amazes me what the campers come up with, when given freedom to play. I learn from watching them. One camper painted a wood square and then used it as a stamp and stuck another square to it. When she pulled the squares apart the most stunning abstract design was the result. You can see this technique in the above picture on the bottom right tray.
You can try the fun techniques on paper.
You can buy a wood tray and add to it.
You can find other random things to paint with from around your house.
There are so many ways to personalize this project or the paint techniques to make something fun today!
What do you think!?! Do you want to make a fun, functional painted piece now!?! Imagine the possibilities. How can you add some color to your world today?
Have you ever wanted to paint a heart?
I used some leftover spray paints and sprayed just the top of my wood pieces. I didn’t need the sides covered or for the whole top to be really even. I was just trying to cover the middle of the wood piece well. I will show you why.
After I painted the tops, I sanded my signs a little with a heavy grit sandpaper. I wanted the color to be mixed a little with a rustic appeal. By sanding the signs a little, some of the color was removed to show the natural wood below again.
This next step is how you get your symmetrical heart. Remember the old elementary school trick of folding a piece of paper in half? Cut one rounded half of your heart, unfold it, and ta-da… perfect heart! So, I cut a bunch of hearts out of thin cardboard. You could use construction paper or even paper bags from the grocery store. Just something that will withstand a little spray paint. The hearts were different sizes and styles. I wanted a mix of different looks, and the different hearts helped create that.  
Now, I laid a cardboard heart on each wood sign and spray painted over them with a different color. The heart cardboard acted as a sticker shadow and allowed the new spray paint color to stay off the previous spray paint layer in the shape of a heart. Since this layer of spray paint is the top layer, you do want to spray paint the sides of your heart sign now.
My hearts were pretty perfect. I did a light sand job to rough the edges up a bit more and then the signs were complete! If you have been following me for a while, you might remember I did this painting trick on 
Do you give out Valentines? Matt and I aren’t a big Valentines Day couple, but I have created a number of different Valentines for our kids through the years. This 
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After I had cut all the wood, we started playing with the best way to attach our side boards to the 12″ squares. Those squares were going to act as our top and bottom of the table, so in short we were building a box.
We used my Ryobi Brad Nailer. It’s my absolute favorite tool. You may remember it from our 
After our box was complete, Jeremiah came in and sanded it down. He used a rough grit sandpaper and went to town on that thing. This boy of mine loves working with his hands. He often sands scrap wood next to me as I paint signs. He will be some kind of artist someday.
After the box was sanded, we screwed on four little wheels we got at our local hardware store for a couple bucks. I marked a spot on the bottom of the box, and Caleb used the screwgun to get the wheels in place.
Once our box was turned right side up and looked more like an end table, we decided it needed a little shelf in the middle to make it more practical. Caleb measured the wood and Jeremiah painted it. We used scrap wood to help give the shelf a little ridge to rest on and used the brad nailer to hold them in place.
Here is the part Reagan was dying for. She got to paint the whole thing. She got quite messy and painted herself in large parts too by bending every which way to cover her project. She had a blast.
Once the paint was dry, we gave it a light sanding job and then stained it.
At times I wanted to jump in and remove a paint drip or wipe off the stain a bit better, but I refrained. I wanted it to be their piece, and it really does look more vintage-y, quirky fun for it. I just love it, and Matt did too!
Here you can see it with his yellow chairs. It fits right in the middle of that nook to hold a coffee, but it can be wheeled out to hold a laptop for a quick meeting as well. Reagan got to paint a frame too 🙂
This was a gift that had time and thought…and it’s practical! I don’t know how much it ended up costing since we had some of the supplies. You can use scrap wood-even for the top and bottom square pieces! Take this idea, modify it to make it your own (in size, style, etc), and have fun!
The creativity in this world amazes me.
While the wrapping paper was taped to the wall, I looked at it off and on and thought how much I loved the print. I decided I wanted to try my hand at painting some flowers inspired by this design. I had a base wood sign that I had already built and painted white. It was a blank canvas waiting to be embellished and make into something. I came up with this idea to create a sign off a phrase that I have done a couple of times before (like in 
It was so fun just going for it. I loved laying my colors on top of each other and adding some details to the flowers to add another depth and color to the painting. It took a little while to wait for colors to dry before I could build on them. In between homeschooling and life I would capture a layer or two, so this part of the sign alone took about three days. It was worth it. I love how the sun was so much more fun and unique because of these flowers and to think it was all inspired by a piece of wrapping paper.
After I sanded, I painted on Minwax’s Early American stain and rubbed it off with an old cloth.
I loved what this step did to the sign. My last step was to add the frame and stain it as well. I quickly measured the pieces and nailed them into place. My sign was finished, and I just adore it!
I think it is a beautiful combination of color with a rustic/artsy edge. It’s so fun. This popular phrase has been made into all kinds of signs, but a small piece of wrapping paper helped me create a sign that I had not done/seen before. I love that we can find inspiration in the craziest of places.
There are items that we can expect to find inspiration. Magazines, blog posts, and Pinterest are just few normal places to find inspiration. What are some of the weird ones you have found inspiration?