Bead Board Tutorial {Guest Post!}

September 5, 2013

Funny story…I pinned this adorable sign the other day and thought to myself, I need to make this for so and so….then, I was walking down the hall at school and one of my friends, also named Amber, said, “Hey! You pinned something I pinned….I made it!” What!?!? So cool! So, here she is with the tutorial so you can leave and say, “I want to make this for so and so…”

From Amber:

This was for my mom’s 50^th birthday so I wanted it to be something sentimental. J

My parents are currently renovating the old Pelzer Library. They are making this into their new home (who knows when it will really be ready?), but they have been working on it in stages.  This building has pretty much had to been gutted and rebuilt from within.  Because it is so old, it has bead board ceilings and walls. My parents have put in old hardwood floors, a claw foot tub, and are even using an old barn door for decorations in the tiny bathroom.  The library is actually a very small building that will be set up kind of like an open layout apartment.  There is one huge room that takes up most of the house. This will be living room and dining room. They have a small bedroom for themselves and another tiny bedroom that will serve as an office/guest room with a pull out love seat.  There is one bathroom and a skinny gallery style kitchen. (When it’s finished, I’ll send in another post to show everyone how cool it is.)

With all of that being said, this building has tons of sentimental value for my parents and a great deal of character. So, when deciding what to give my mama for her monumental birthday, I knew it had to be something that would be special to her.  So, my dad so graciously nailed together 5-6 pieces of old bead board from the library that were not being used and cut their lengths to about 2-3 feet to make a square/rectangular shape that would make something that could be used as a sign to hang on the wall.  He connected these boards with small pieces of wood along the back that were nailed in to keep it together.  I ended up putting pieces of felt on the back, so when it was finished it wouldn’t scratch up the wall.

Once the pieces were nailed together, I decided to paint it one single color because the boards were royal blue, purple, and yellow. (They did not match at all.) I chose a color that I had a sample of already at home called Granny Smith.  It’s a great green that I have used for several Pinterest projects around the house.  After the paint dried, I did some sanding to rough the edges up and allow some of those colors that didn’t match to peek through and give a more rustic look.  From there, I began to draw out with a pencil the saying, “It’s the LITTLE things in LIFE.”  I don’t like things to be centered all the time so I right-aligned the words to give it a different look. After I had drawn the words with a pencil to my liking (which took a while because I tend to be a perfectionist), I painted the letters with a dark chocolate brown. I had to do several coats so you couldn’t see the brush strokes.  Once the letters were dark enough and dry, I went to sanding again to rough up the letters.  I didn’t want it to look too crisp and clean (Weird, I know.)

The initial plan was to be finished with the saying on the boards, but then my husband and I started brainstorming about things that my mother loved to fill in the big empty space to left.  So…we decided on a simple yellow bird.  My husband did an amazing paint job with the bird, using the color Firefly to stand out on the green boards.  We hot glued a cute burlap beak (because anything burlap makes it better) and used buttons to create a wing and an eye. The buttons were actually from an older friend of the family, which was something unique as well.

Once we finished it up, it was easy to wrap and tie a burlap bow around to give to her.  We gave it to her this past weekend, and she loved it! I would definitely make another one. If you aren’t a perfectionist like myself, it may not take you as long.

So, how cool, is this!?!?!? Aren’t you dying to see this library turned home? Do you think you’ll make something similar? What are you making from bead board?