diy song lyric art

Awhile back I saw this post on Kelsie's blog where she had put some lyrics to a song on an ugly painting. I loved the idea and I've been on the lookout for the perfect painting. I needed something with good colors, that was big enough to make a statement {I'm thinking above the mantel... someday, when we have a mantel}.... oh, and it needed to be cheap. Huge paintings on the cheap are hard to come by, even when you're shopping thrift stores. 

Enter this painting. 

It's a very quiet little farm scene, and I fell in love with the yellow in the tree. As you can see, the bottom of the painting wasn't attached to its frame. Guess how much this beauty cost us? $5.00. Yep, that's cheap enough for me. 

Next step? Picking the song lyrics. This one was pretty easy. Our song has been "I think I love you" since the day Matt sent me a link to it years ago. We were chatting... not dating... nothing... All of a sudden the chat box has "I think I love you" in it, and I freaked! I didn't bother listening to the song {which says "and if you say, 'hey, go away!' I will"}. I was like "How can you love me if you don't even know me?" I proceeded to tell him every bad thing I'd ever done in hopes of scaring him off. 

Happily, it didn't work. :) And now it's our song. 

So, I got sticker letters from Hobby Lobby and worked on the spacing.

After they were as perfect as they could be, I took the backs off the stickers and made it all official. 

By this time, I was more in love with the painting than I had originally anticipated. Christopher {my brother} suggested that instead of blasting it with a dozen coats of glossy white, I spritz it a couple times and leave the painting in foggy view. Seemed like the right idea to me.

My awful habit of nail biting kept me from the next step. Enter Matthew. 

While he was busy peeling stickers, I tackled the second part of the project. You saw the wooden frame the painting came with, but I wanted to update it. I've recently heard wonders about a tube of paint?/stain? called "rub n buff" and I wanted to give it a shot.

It worked wonders, taking my frame from wood to brass in only a couple of minutes.

I pulled down the meaningless number art that used to hang in our hallway, and up went my new favorite piece of art.

It's a little hard to read in the lighting, but I love its subtlety. 

I think I love you. Isn't that what life is made of? 

:) Isn't it?