For Mother's Day, I wanted to create a special gift for my mom. I decided to make her a family tree.
I found it difficult to design a family tree for our small family. I wanted to incorporate my parents, my brother, my husband, and my children. I decided to make 3 branches (the center coming off of the trunk for my parents, the left branch for me, and the right branch for my brother).
Once I had a plan, I started painting. I painted a board solid green first. The green was only meant to peek through when I distressed the board. Then, I painted the board off white. When that was done, I painted blue and green for a sky and grass. To give it texture, I dry brushed. It still left more paint than I wanted so I went back with a damp brush and removed some paint. I really liked the background.
I then made a tree pattern from paper. I traced the tree on the board.
I then painted the tree in brown. This is the first coat. I painted three.
After the board dried, I distressed the board with the mouse sander.
I then rubbed stain into the board to further distress the board.
The background is ready for the leaves to be added.
Using my Silhouette, I cut a lot of leaves in many sizes. I then used distressing ink around each leaf to define each leaf.
I wrote the families' names and birthdates on each leaf. I also wrote our marriage dates. I then arranged the leaves and mod podged them on to the tree trunk.
Here's Mariella's leaf. Because we are a small family, most of the leaves were not written on.
After the bottom layer of Mod Podge dried, I Mod Podged the entire board and let it dry.
After the Mod Podge was completely dry, I coated the entire board in Polyurethane.
When the first coat dried, I did a second coat.
After the Polyurethane dried, I drilled holes in the top of the board.
I then thread a wire through the holes and curled the end of the wire around a pencil to hold it in place.
Here's the finished product.
