DIY Christmas Wall Art

December 1st. The day I can officially start my Christmas-ing and not feel guilty about being too early. Yay! This year I got quite crafty and have made a few ornaments, a gift and a couple holiday decor items. I blame Pinterest, really. So much inspiration. Makes me feel like I need to craft to be cool. I also blame being on maternity leave: a lot of time and not a lot of money. 
I wanted to Christmas-up the main floor a little more this year. Usually we only have our fake tree in the window on that floor and the basement room gets all the Christmas cheer (and the real tree), since that's where the fireplace is. I wanted something to match the red and white theme of our main floor tree. Yes, we have 2 Christmas trees in our house. It's because Hubby always has had a real tree, and I have always had a fake one. So we compromise and have both. Excessive? Perhaps. Christmasy? Heck yes! 
So, I popped over to Michael's and found some canvas on a super-sale, grabbed a couple of bottles of $0.79 acrylic paint and a couple of packs of white sparkly letter stickers, and made myself some Christmas wall art. All in all it took about 30 mins to do, and I think it looks great. It's pretty much exactly what I was looking for: something Christmasy, but not overly so. 
Here's how I did it:
I started with the blank canvas (obviously). Mine were 16"x 20"

I painted it all over in a bright red acrylic paint. Tip I learned the hard way: make sure to paint around the side of the canvas before doing the main part. It's way easier than doing it after it's all pretty on the top. 

While the paint was still wet, I dipped the brush in a deeper wine colour and brushed it over the red. Then I just blended it in long streaks to give it a bit of depth. I think it makes it look a little more rustic and interesting. 
Then, when dry I peeled off the backing on the letters and stuck them on in the arrangement I wanted. Here's what I came up with:

I was a bit limited in the sayings I could create because I am cheap and didn't want to buy more than 2 packs of the letters. And there are an awful lot of "S"s in most Christmas sayings. 

Here's a close up to show the sparkly-ness

I love how they turned out. I paid a whopping total of about $25 for the supplies and spent about 30 minutes making them. Sah-weet! 
I have another super easy (and cheap!) Christmas decor project to show you next week. 
Also, you may have noticed a change in the blog address. I am now on my own domain at www.upmommycreek.com! Exciting! So please update your bookmarks if you have 'em.