Supplies:
- Long piece of wood. My piece of wood was a piece of scrap wood from my dad. It is about 7 ¼ inches wide and 45 ¼ inches tall. You can also pick up a piece of wood from a hardware store. Some hardware stores will also cut your piece of wood down for you. I recommend asking if they can/will cut it for you first before purchasing. It really depends on the location and people working at the store if they will cut it for you or not.
- Wood stain. I used a dark walnut.
- Polycrylic (pick the gloss you like. gloss for a shinny look when applied. Mat for no extra shine when applied)
- An old rag or brush to apply the stain and another one to apply the polycrylic
- Permanent vinyl (any brand you like to use should work, just make sure it is a permanent vinyl so it lasts outside)
- Wood cut outs. You could do everything in wood cut outs or everything in vinyl.
- Acrylic paint if you are using wood cut outs and want to paint the wood.
- My design, which you can find in my shop or in my Etsy shop.
- Wood glue if you cut pieces out of wood
I started off by cleaning off my wood. Since it was in my dad’s scrap wood pile, there was some dirt that needed to be cleaned off. My wood was very smooth, but if your wood needs to be sanded down, now is the time to do so. Once your wood is prepped and ready to go, you can apply your wood stain and/or spray paint. You could also paint your wood board with acrylic or other types of paint. You should do one side of your board, then wait for that side to dry before doing the other side. I was going to do a second layer of spray paint on my green side, but my spray paint decided to malfunction. It would only spray air out. I tried fixing it, but could not get it to work. So, my wood only got one coat of spray paint, and a little bit of the wood can be seen thought the spray paint layer. This is actually kind of a nice look as well.
Once the stain, spray paint, or paint has dried, you should apply a layer of polycrylic to both sides including the edges of your wood board. This will protect your wood from the elements as well as help the vinyl stick to the wood. Apply the polycrylic to one side of the wood, and the edges, then let it dry, before turning your wood over and applying the polycrylic to the other side.
Check out the YouTube video by clicking the video below or click here to go to YouTube so you can save the video.
While the wood board is drying, I cut out my vinyl layers for my Grinch side of my board. I also cut out my sunflower welcome pieces out of wood on my Glowforge. You can do both sides out of vinyl, or both sides out of wood if you would like.
If you cut the sunflower out of wood like I did, then I recommend placing tape over all your pieces to help keep them together and to help keep the spacing correct. You could also keep the wood cutout and use that as a template when gluing down all your petal pieces. I also painted and applied polycrylic to all my wood pieces before gluing them to my board with wood glue. This just made it easier in my opinion, and I did not have to worry as much about being a little messy.
I painted my wood flower while it was still taped down in the cutout. This helped protect the sides from getting paint on them. It was also nice for helping blend my yellow and brown paint onto the flower. Once the pieces were dry I applied the polycrylic. Then I glued down and spaced all my white wooden letters first. Once they were all glued down, I took off my tape from my flower, the flower petals came off with the tape. I then lined up and place my wood template on my board. Then one by one I applied glue and placed my flower petals into the template. By having the flower petals in position on the tape, it helped me know which piece needed to go where.
For the vinyl layer my stand of lights, they were too long to fit on my 12 x 12 sheet of vinyl. So, I needed to slice/cut this piece to make it fit on my vinyl. To slice my stand of light to make them fit, I first moved all other pieces away from the piece I was working on. I then created a square (shapes on the left-hand side). I then changed the size of this square to be 11 x 11. A mat is 12 x 12, but the actual cutting area of the Cricut is 11.5. I then placed my square over the piece I wanted to cut. I lined up the square, so it ended on a piece of the wire, not on one of the light bulbs. You can make your square smaller or move it around to get it to be positioned to your liking over your piece. I then selected both the square and the stand of lights, and hit the slice button on the bottom right side of the screen. Now move all layers off to the side, and delete all the pieces we do not need, which should be all the gray pieces if you did not change the color of your square. If you are not happy with the cut, then you can always hit the undo button a few times in the upper left corner of the screen. If you have a 12 x 24 mat, and vinyl that is also 12 x 24, then you do not need to do the steps I just mentioned.
I actually ended up not putting the light bulbs together. I liked having four separate pieces to place around my sign. I put the ends of my light bulbs under letters to hide the ends and make it look like they were coming out of the letters.
When I cut my vinyl, I wanted to save as much vinyl as I could. So, I did not attach my pieces before cutting them. If you attach your pieces, then Cricut will keep the spacing and positioning of your pieces. This makes it easier when applying the vinyl cut outs to your piece, because you do not have to worry about the spacing, it is already spaced. However, this will make sections not fit on the normal 12 x 12 mats. The Grinchmas words will not even fit on the larger 12 x 24 mat, and thus need to be cut on smart vinyl, on either a Cricut Maker 3 or a Cricut Explorer Air 3.
When placing my vinyl, I weeded out everything I did not want. I then used transfer tape and rulers to help me line my letters up straight and space them out. I then placed my green light bulb wire pieces. Next, I placed the colored bulbs where they were suppose to go. Each light bulb is slightly different, so you have to make sure you put the correct pieces on the correct bulbs. Lastly, I placed the gold bottom to the light bulbs, again this go on specific bulbs. This took a little more time, but if you attach everything, it is easier to match everything.
Before making any pieces make sure they are the correct size to fit your piece of wood. You can also change the colors of the Permanent vinyl or paint the wood pieces a different color or stain them. You can even do just one side of this board if you want. Do not forget to apply the polycrylic over any wood pieces you add to your board. You do not need to apply the polycrylic over the permanent vinyl.
I really like how this piece turned out. You can add a bow to your wood sign if you want, but I decided not to, because the weather would not be pleasant on the bow material. I like that it can stay out all year around. You just flip it over for Christmas, then flip it back over when Christmas is over. You can make it for different holidays as well. I did one side with vinyl and the other with wood cutouts using my Glowforge so you could see how to do either or both ways. Some Cricut machines can also cut wood, and these shapes are pretty large and simple, that they could possibly be done on a Cricut machine. My designs can be cut on many different machines and materials. Do you have a favorite side? I like both sides, but if I had to choose I would pick the welcome side. The wood cutout sunflower is just absolutely beautiful. This sign looks so much better in real life, than the pictures.
Cat for size 😉 
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