I saw this project in one of the Link partied that I peruse. And I loved it. I definitely wanted to make on for my home. We are atop a hill and get enough wind that a fabric Flag would be shredded quickly. But then I was also looking for a meaningful gift for my Dad. So that is what this turned into. Frank receives lots of orders of things on pallets so I knew that I could get a couple dropped off at the house.
To say that the pallets were not nearly as pretty as the one used by Sweet Something Designs is a major understatement. The ones I received had been used and reused for years. You could see the nail hole where wood had been taken from old pallets and reused to make this one. I was doubtful about it in the beginning but it turned out all the better.
First I took all the cross beams off of the pallet. I laid them all side by side and re-arranged them so that they complimented each other. I then turned them all up side down. I happened to have enough scraps from another project to make 3 braces across the back. If I hadn't, I would have just taken more wood from the pallet and sawed it to length. I applied wood glue and then nailed the braces on from behind just to hold things together while the glue dried. I actually started out with all the edges even but, I was getting hot and tired and the kids wanted dinner and nailing into a through 2 pieces of wood that have a good amount of glue between them was quite the job. So as you can see, the wood was all cattywampus.
The next morning I removed the nailed that I had put in from the back. I purposefully used nails that were way too long so that they would be easy to remove. Then I flipped it up to the right side. I then nailed each piece into the braces from the front. I used 1.5 inch nails with no heads. I nailed each piece 6 times. 2 per brace. Because the wood was warped, the glue didn't make good contact with each board and wasn't going to be enough to keep it secure.
Then I taped it off for the stripes. I measured the height and divided that by 13 to get the width of each stripe. Then I Googled "American Flag Measurements" I found a site that said the Star panel was .4 of the whole width. I wanted to make sure that it looked proportional.
I didn't have the deep red color that I wanted so I mixed some. I Googled "Mixing Frosting Colors" Weird I know. But I knew that there was a mixing guide to get almost any color in existence that had been put out by Wilton. I found it and it said to mix bright red with purple. I just want to add here that, as with frosting, it is better to mix more than you think you will need, because you will NEVER EVER be able to mix the exact same color again.
(just cause it is pretty)Got it painted.
I was going to go over it lightly with a palm sander but honestly, the wood had so much character, there was nothing I could add by sanding it.
I mixed some burnt umber acrylic paint with water and put it on with a sponge brush then wiped it off doing small sections at a time and wiping with the grain of the wood.
I let the kids help with this part of the painting because there was little that could be messed up.
The Finish just brings out all the character and texture in the wood, and that makes the whole thing in my opinion.
I loved it so much when it was done and the only reason I was able to give it away was the fact that I knew that Daddy would love it as much as I do. And he did.
