How to Make an Americana Wooden Sign

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This post brought to you by FrogTape Brand Painter’s Tape. All opinions are 100% mine.

I have always loved Americana decorations. I have a whole Pinterest board devoted to the 4th of July and the crafts and foods I can make around that day. This year, I actually started planning to make this sign early enough to enjoy it for Independence Day. I kept seeing different Americana decorations on Pinterest and I designed this sign around many of the other ones that I've seen. I just changed it up a little to make it my own.

I went out to our building scraps pile and found a board that would work. It just so happens the board was already painted red, because this was a scrap from the soffit work that my husband was replacing in March. (Yes, our soffits are painted red.) It was also the perfect sized rectangle for a flag sign.

I started by using my Multi-Surface Frog Tape® to tape off where the blue part of the flag will be. Since the top coat had been on more than 3 days, this tape was the perfect choice. Had it been on at least 24 hours but less than 3 days, I would have chosen the Frog Tape® Delicate.

Be sure to press down firmly along the edges of the Frog Tape® to prevent paint bleed.

Frog Tape® is the only painter's tape that is treated with PaintBlock® Technology. PaintBlock® is an absorbent polymer which reacts with latex paint and instantly gels to form a micro-barrier that actually seals the edges of the tape, preventing that paint bleed. Prety cool stuff!

Next, I covered the rest of the sign with a plastic bag so I didn't end up spraying it. However, covering the whole thing with Frog Tape® would have worked even better! Then, I spray painted the part that was to be blue with white spray paint. Why, you ask? Becuase that is what color the star is supposed to be!

I printed a star off from the computer and cut it out.

I laid it in the middle of the white painted area while the paint was still a little wet so that it would stay down. I quickly spray painted blue over the top of it, all the way up to my Frog Tape® edge.

I quickly peeled the star off before the paint dried any more, making it a permanenet fixture to my board.

I then removed the Frog Tape® that was there, so that I could tape off the red and white lines. To do that, I placed a piece all the way to the edge on the top and all the way to the edge on the bottom. The middle piece, I just eyed and placed it halfway between the other 2.

I painted that area white while my daughter held up construction paper to protect the blue.

As soon as I had the white on as thick as I wanted it, I carefully pulled the Frog Tape® up. See how nice and clean my line is? I've used other brands of painters tape before and I had horrible bleed lines. With this Frog Tape®, the only time I had a bleed spot was when I realized I hadn't pressed down on the tape in a certain spot. Whoops. You have to do it right in order for it to work right! 🙂

After I pulled off all of the tape, this is what she looked like!

I was so pleased with the final product! I think it's a gorgeous addition to my patriotic decor!

You would not believe the other projects that I'm dreaming up to use the Frog Tape® with. Did you know that they have several different kinds? They have Shape Tape™ where you can make chevron stripes on a wall, waves or even scallop. There's also Textured Surface™ and Delicate Surface™ in addition to the Multi-Surface™ that I used for this project.

My daughter and I are trying to decide what we're going to paint on her wall. She wants chevron stripes or some other design (she keeps changing her mind), but we're excited to know that Frog Tape® will work for us! The last time I painted stripes on a wall, it was a disaster with all of the paint bleed and peeling ripping paint that I experienced.

If you're interested in staying up to date with other DIY projects, be sure to visit the FrogTape how-to section of their website. You can also follow Frog Tape® on Twitter, where you'll find tons of creative inspiration!