One Cream, No Sugar: Snowman | Scarecrow Pallet Project

Guys! I made a thing! All by myself!
Well if we're being honest, the boyfriend did break down the pallet, but after that it was all me!

Yeah, that right there, I made that! It's actually just one piece, a front and a back. Five pallet pieces in total! I originally found saw this going around Pinterest, but one there were now how-tos, and two I didn't wanna buy it pre-made, I really wanted to use the pallets.

So to start with I had to get a pallet. There's a place I drive by every day on my way to and from work that always has pallets out for free... expect of course for the one time I really want some. Lucky for me we have junk pallets at work that I was able to snag some from.

There are a variety of ways on the internet of how to take apart a pallet. I didn't do this part. Blake, the boyfriend, did. He pulled all the nails out using a hammer. Which sounds exhausting! Apparently you can also take one apart using a sawzall.

Once it was taken apart, there are two next steps, sand all the pieces you have, or sand only the pieces you'll use. I choose the latter because I really dislike sanding things.

Either way you'll want to decide which pieces you're going to use. I went though all my pieces to find which pieces went together the best. I used four pallet pieces for the body and one for the brim of the hat.

After they were all sanded I had to cut the brim of the hat in half. You know the whole measure twice, cut once thing, yeah I did that. What they don't mention is to take into account the width of the saw. Oops. I was cutting it a second time to take about an inch off.

I then labeled which order the boards would go in so I didn't have to figure it out after they were painted. Also I had to mark where the brim would be on both sides. Which took three tries. And I still messed it up. Oh well, thankfully paint can cover itself.

Then is time to paint/stain. I got all my paints and stains from Home Depot. When I started this project they were having a sale on all their paint and stain samples. 8oz for less and two or three bucks. I did end up purchasing a paint pen from Joann's for the detail work. It was perfect! This whole project cost me about $16 to make. Below are the paints I used:

Scarecrow:
Dark Brown Hat
Brown Body

Snowman:
Black Hat
White Body

Orange
Pink

Black Detail Work

My biggest issue with painting was the scarecrow's body. I choose a stain, which was super light. So to get the color I really wanted I "painted" the stain on. Basically I just didn't wipe off the stain.

Day one I did the scarecrow side, roughly trying to follow my guidelines for where the brim of the hat would go. I was a total success on this side! This side took about 3 coats of paint. Well many coats of the light stain before I decided to use it like paint, then it was only one. But the dark side I mainly used the stain like paint and that took about 3 layer to get the color shade I wanted.

The snowman side, not so much. After it was all but together I definitely needed to do some tough ups. This would have taken only one coat. But I had to repaint one section, so I repainted the entire thing with a second coat.

Next was time to attached everything together. Here is where it got a little tricky. I wasn't sure what I would need. I did measure how tall the project was with both brims on so I would know what size nail to get (no larger than one inch for my project). I highly recommend doing this, as the thickness of pallet boards varies. But I only got the one inch nails. While putting it together I had wished I would have bought a little longer nails. With the brims nailed on, it didn't feel study enough to me.
**I did read somewhere online that you should mark where you'll put your nails in so they don't hit each other. I didn't not do this. I kind of just did "upper left" on one side and "lower right" on the other. Someone it worked, I didn't hit any nails**
The hardest part was nailing the top and bottom together. I barely succeeded at this, so I don't totally recommend my way. Basically I just tried to but the nails in at an angle so they would go from one board to the next (hence the longer nails being helpful). My next pallet project I may try a different way. Blake suggested wood glue, but that would require a c-clamp of sorts, and patience. The patience is what I didn't have. I just wanted to get to designing!

For the faces I drew them on with pencil first, then painted them on. It was around this time I discovered that I'm not skilled at detail work. So off to Joann's I went to find a paint pen. Once I had the paint pen it was smooth sailing. I even bought a bunch off amazon after for future projects!

So here are the finished pictures!