Faith. Family. Freedom.

My husband and I were living in an old, run down apartment that I had almost given up on making our "home." I didn't want to paint because I knew we would be moving within the next few months, but I just had the urge to paint SOMETHING. It occured to me that canvases are a great way to show one's artistic abilities & add a spalsh of color to a plain white wall as well.

I had some pictures of my husband and I hanging in our dining room & thought how cool it would be to add a plaque type canvas or piece of wood below each one. I went to Michael's to find something that may fit in this category. I found three 4 x 12 canvases in a pack for around $20. I had a 40% off a single item coupon which brought the total to about $12. I also grabbed some red, white, and blue acrylic paint (the same paint I used on the wooden anchor).

Upon bringing the canvases home, I had no idea what I was going to write or design on them. I started looking around our apartment, reading books, & listening to music for inspiration. I have three metal decor pieces that have LIVE LAUGH LOVE etched into them. It hit me that I wanted to come up with something that conveys the foundation of our home. FAITH for our enormous faith in our Lord & Savior. FAMILY because we are extremely close knit, with not only each other, but our extended family as well. And FREEDOM because that's what my husband fights for each day he goes to work.

I grabbed a piece of contract paper that we had used to wrap Christmas gifts last year & spread it across our kitchen island to start my project. I used scotch tape to tape off hard lines & edges. I probably should have invested in a cheap roll of masking tape because the scotch tape didn't stick to the canvas like it does to paper. When I completed the background color/pattern, I used a pencil to free hand the words & images onto the canvas.

My husband was underway for a week or so when I was working on this project, so I tried to spread it out over three days time. The total time for the project would have taken about 6 hours (2 hours per canvas) if I hadn't spread it out between three days. The most time consuming part was waiting for the paint to dry so that I could add the next detail. I'm very happy with the finished product & they look so much better in our new apartment! :)