My VERY first sign...

There are SO many great sign-makers out there in blogland providing oodles of inspiration. I decided to give it a try myself (like any DIY'er would do). I got a scrap board from Home Depot for $.55 - awesome. As the ideas were swirling around in my head, I knew I definitely wanted the sign to have some personal meaning. Then, I remembered I had this soap dish. Ok. Let me back up a bit. Before the hubby and I were even engaged, we both graduated from college and went to Europe. We spent about five and a half weeks cruising around France, Italy, & Switzerland. It was A-mazing!! Major understatement. MAJOR. Anyway, We started our trip in Paris, and ended it in Paris. Both of us fell in love with that beautiful city, and 10 days (five on the front end and five on the back) really wasn't even enough to soak in all the beauty. So, back to the soap dish. I've had this for a while and I love the look of it. I decided I wanted my sign to have this look, but with the name of the hotel where we stayed in Paris.

I grabbed my photo album to get all the info (& of course I got sidetracked for about 30 minutes flipping through the pages). Hotel de Suez. A magical place (at least to us it is). Absolutely PERFECT for my little sign! I painted the wood board white and got right to work.

(that's me in the bottom left corner holding some ice cream that we got from a cart).

The hubby grew a beard while we were traveling so he didn't have to worry about shaver adapters, etc. Ha ha, classic).

I printed out some letters using my trusty Cricut (love this thing).

It would have looked cool if I mod podged the paper letters on, but I decided to paint them to give it a more authentic look.

Here is the sign before I took it outside and distressed the heck out of it. I was a bit nervous at first, but I just went for it and I'm happy I did.

Ta-daa!!!!

I rubbed some stain over the whole thing and wiped it off with a rag (just so the wood spots weren't so light). Subtle, but antique-ish looking.

Here's the view from my bed. I get to see it every morning when I wake up and it triggers such happy memories. What a way to start each day, huh!?

Just look at all that shabby goodness!!

I love it, love it, love it! This project only cost me $.55 for the wood board. I had all of the other supplies on hand. Yay! Pretty good for a beginner I think :)