DECK THE HALLS PALLET ART

When my friend Judy was coming to visit, I told her I wanted us to make something wonderful for a Christmas project when she was here and would she please give it some thought.  Judy is the kind of friend who really will give it some thought and she sure did.  She called me one day with an idea and I knew immediately it was exactly what I wanted to do.  She told me she thought that a pallet looked like the perfect platform for music bars and did I think we could do a Christmas carol on one.  Well yes, I did!

Now figuring out how to do it was the challenge, but when Judy and I put our minds together, we can figure out anything!  She arrived from Arizona with some sheet music to choose from.  I selected "Deck the Halls" because, well, it just seemed appropriate for making some Christmas art. 

 
The hardest part was making the bars of music big enough to fit on a pallet board.  Since I'm the computer genius of the two of us, I went to work scanning in the music, cleaning it up a little, eliminating the Slurs, the Furmata and the Tuplets, anything that was going to be a problem fitting the board height.  We were going to use only the first line, but it needed to made into 3 separate parts.  Using a blank on picmonkey, I separated each part, the treble, the words and the base into three lines.  We measured our pallet boards so that we could get the right dimensions.  Then I  transferred them onto a travel drive and we jumped in the car and went to Staples to get them blown up on their big blueprint printer.  Believe it or not, because we only used black and white, it cost us like $3.00 total.  We brought them home, cut them down, antiqued them with some antiquing gel and tore the edges to give it a more aged look.

Using mod podge, we adhered the lines to the boards and put a coat over the top as well.  

Now, all we needed to do was "cute it up" as my sister Amber says.  Judy and I think that's the best part because it involves shopping!  We went to Hobby Lobby, Big Lots and JoAnn's (we're sale shoppers for sure) to find some ribbon and greenery for embellishment.  We spent about $10.00 on ribbons and floral picks and if you are keeping track here, we're up to $13.00 on this project, I'll add $2.00 for the mod podge and antiquing gel we used, which I already had, making it $15.00  Judy has a better eye for floral stuff than I do and she put it all together to make the bow and greenery for the title board.  She assembled 3 different picks to make greenery for each side.  She is awesome!

We fastened it all to the pallet by drilling a couple of small holes through the board and wiring it.  Judy curled the ribbon a little and this project was done!

When Sam came home and gave it all of the appropriate compliments that a crafters husband should, Judy said this....."I think it would be a good project for a silent auction donation or something."  It just fell right out of her mouth before I could stop her!!!  A silent auction???  I wanted this for my living room!  I already knew what Sam would say, because he sits on the board for the Chamber of Commerce and we have a silent auction every year at our Christmas party.   (The proceeds go to a scholarship for a local high school student.)  Yep....he said, "Why don't you girls make another one?"   This was a big project and it took us about 3 days and most of my living room!  We told Sam if he would get the pallet and cut it down we'd do it.  

Here is the second one we did.

    Which do you like better.....the top one or the bottom?

 One of them is staying on my living room wall and the other is going to the silent auction.  Total cost of this project, $15.00.  Time spent with my best friend making it.....priceless!

Love you Judy!

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