Valentine’s Day – Wisconsin Magpie

Meet my new state-of-the-heart bulletin board.

This is what it looked like when I bought it (at a thrift store, of course). It had a nice beefy frame that was painted in a neutral cream color — and the paint was chipping in spots, so there was a little bit of mint green showing through here and there. I loved the chunky, chippy old frame. The orange cork, not so much.

To de-orangify the cork, I broke out some leftover cream chalk paint (Americana Decor Chalky Finish/Lace). It took two coats to cover.

I didn’t want my lovely new/old bulletin board to get overwhelmed with notes and photos and general clutter, so I decided I’d put a neat, orderly collage on the top half of it. To make the collage, I picked up three packages of different sized heart cutouts.

The pink and red were not working for me, so I painted the hearts black.

I found a map of Wisconsin online that I sized to fit the width of the bulletin board and printed out.

I lined up the tiled pieces of the map, taped them together and then cut around the perimeter.

Next I lightly traced all the way around the border with a pencil.

Then I started filling inside the map with my hearts.

I started at the bottom and worked from the outside in.

I tried to keep the outside row of hearts as close to the border as I could. I also tried to keep the pattern random, alternating the sizes of the hearts and the direction they were facing as much as possible.

When I had all the pieces roughly where I wanted them to go, I adhered them to the board. The formerly red glitter hearts I stuck down with rubber cement. The others were peel-and-stick.

The last thing I did was erase the pencil line. (I started erasing it before I adhered the hearts, but every time I tried blowing the eraser residue away I would inadvertently blow unattached hearts all over. So eventually I wised up and realized I would be better off to stick everything down first.)

Here’s the bulletin board propped up on my desk. I can still tack notes and things to the bottom half of the board, but the top is all nice and neat.

Valentine’s Day decorations are generally not my thing. Most of the mass-produced ones out there are way too saccharine sweet and frilly for me.

So this year, I decided I’d make my own Valentine’s Day decor: something with a vintage industrial vibe that I wouldn’t mind actually hanging in my house.

I started with these little aluminum pans that I found at a thrift store. I wasn’t sure exactly what I was going to do with them when I bought them — but I knew it wasn’t going to involve baking.

Pretty much every craft project I do lately begins with a coat of black chalk paint, so that’s where I started with this one, too.

Then I cut a few hearts out of an old newspaper to layer over the black background.

And, as luck would have it, I had the letters I needed to spell out the word “LOVE” in the stash of random letters and numbers that I have hoarded over the years.

I wasn’t thrilled with the bright colors, so the letters got a coat of black chalk paint, too.

Then I put some silver craft paint over top, slapdash style, letting the black peek through for a tarnished metal effect.

I drilled holes in the top and bottom of each pan …

… just big enough to pull a piece of twine through.

I grunged up the newspaper hearts with some watered down paint and old coffee grounds…

… and I Mod Podged the newspaper onto the bottom on the pans.

To tie the hearts all together, I threaded pieces of jute twine through the holes.

I had a few beads on hand that I added here and there. (I wish I would have had more.)

The last step was to glue the letters on over the newspaper.

(The letters have magnets in them, but the pans are aluminum, and unfortunately magnets don’t stick to aluminum; hence the need for glue.)

Here’s the completed string o’ hearts. Love it.

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Category: Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day | Wisconsin bulletin board

Valentine’s Day | Hearts on a string decoration