DIY canvas “Our greatest blessings call us…”

My sister-in-law and I wanted to get her parents something special from the babies at Christmas.  She had seen this quote (“Some of our greatest blessings call us…”) and loved it but couldn't find anything with it that she really liked.  So that's where I come in!  We decided to make something instead.  I designed the canvas, she picked out the pictures for it and I made it.  It’s surprisingly simple and doesn't take that long to make.  You could easily tweak this to suit your taste: swap out the quote for another one, change the layout of the pictures or do away with the pictures altogether.  Here’s the tutorial showing how I made ours.

Supplies (I bought all of mine at Michael’s craft store):

• Canvas (whatever size you want; I used 11 x 14)
• Acrylic paint (I used Americana Pebble and Craft Smart Vanilla)
• Paint brushes (I used some that I’ve had for years.  I actually used one of those cheap sponge brushes to paint on the background color.  Then, I used a paintbrush with a very small tip to paint the letters.)
• Tracing paper
• No. 2 pencil

I used the following for the picture portion, so if you are only doing the quote you wouldn't need these.

• Picture mat(s) (to serve as frames on the canvas)
• Picture(s)
• Clear tape
• Fabric glue (I used Aleene’s Original Tacky Glue in the little gold bottle)
• Books or something sort of heavy to place on top of the mats while the glue is drying

Step 1. Place everything on the canvas to decide on the layout.  I don’t have a picture of this step, but I sketched the quote on a plain sheet of copier paper for sizing purposes and laid that out with my “frames”.
Step 2. Paint the entire canvas.  Don’t forget the sides!  Depending on the color and coverage of your paint you may need two coats to get a nice even color.  I used one of those cheap sponge brushes to paint on the background color (Americana paint in Pebble).

Step 3. If you are hand writing the quote, have your sketch handy.  If you prefer you can design your quote on the computer and print it out.  Whatever you decide to use, copy your quote onto tracing paper.  There’s a trick to this, though.  You have to trace it on the side that would touch the canvas, so it basically looks backwards (see picture below). Be sure to do pretty heavy tracing.  There needs to be a good solid pencil mark on there for it to transfer to the canvas.

Step 4. Now that you've traced the quote onto the tracing paper, tape the tracing paper to the canvas where you want the quote to appear.

Step 5. Take your pencil and go over the quote. This process will transfer the pencil marks on the back of the tracing paper (from step 3) onto the canvas.  When you’re done you should be able to see a faint outline of the quote on the canvas, as seen below (well maybe; I promise it’s there, but the quality of this picture isn't the best). Tip: It’s a good idea to check it and make sure it’s transferring after you've done a few letters and really throughout the process.  If it’s not transferring well, try tracing it with more pressure.  If that still doesn't work it might be that the pencil marks on the back of the tracing paper (side touching the canvas) aren't heavy enough.  I hope that makes sense!

Step 6. Paint your quote.  I used a small tipped brush and Craft Smart paint in Vanilla. This is the most difficult part because it can be tricky to paint letters and make it look good, especially if you are using narrow script/font.  I’d do a test with the brush you’re planning to use for this part.  I found I had to do smaller and more frequent strokes to keep the color even or else I ended up with big globs of paint where I ended each stroke.

Step 7. Time for pictures!  Tape your picture onto the back of the mat to hold it in place.  Then, glue the mat onto the canvas with fabric glue.  I put one line of Aleene’s Original Tacky Glue on each of the four sides of the mat and placed it on the canvas. I put a heavy book on top to apply pressure while it dried.  I left it on for a couple hours just for good measure. Once the glue is dry you’re all done!