DIY - Horseshoe "lucky" wooden sign

One day while skimming through Pinterest I came across a wooden sign that had the phrase LUCKY with a horse shoe for the U. I just had to do one identical to it for myself. Now I am not the most western person out there, but for a few years I did get really into horses/rodeos.

Let me get side tracked a little bit and explain how my love for horses began... Early in 2009 I begged my parents to put me in horseback riding lessons, they finally gave in, and I fell in love. I loved riding horses, and I immediately wanted one of my own. Around the beginning of August the begging began! (I was the most annoying beggar as a child, my poor parents haha!) One day after my lesson as I was taking the saddle and bridal off of the trainers horse, I remember telling my mom something along the lines of me needing one, and how I would take such great care of it. My mom must of said something a long the lines of her not knowing where to buy a horse, because my trainer said that a family that boarded their horses at the facility I took lessons at was selling their black and white paint quarter horse. At this point, my mom probably went home and begged by father to buy me the horse for my upcoming birthday the end of Septmeber. (Maybe that is where I get it from haha!). My parents just kept saying "maybe one day" or "we don't have time for a horse" etc. to keep me not suspicious. One day right before my birthday we showed up to the facility for my lesson and my trainer told me to go back and get the horse, like I did at the start of every lesson. I walked back through the stables and inside of the stall was the most beautiful horse with a bright pink bridle and a bow on its forehead. My parents ended up buying the horse that the family was selling at the facility. His name was Ajay, and he was tallest prettiest horse I had seen, probably because he was all mine haha. I kept doing lessons and 4-H after I got the horse. After getting pretty confident in my riding skills I started to do 4-H competitions , and queening in rodeos. I ended up placing in several rodeos and 4-H competitions. I had kind of had slight allergies from the beginning, nothing an allergy pill couldn't fix, but as time went on I became more and more allergic. It got to the point that I would have to sit in the car while my mom got my horse all cleaned up and ready for a show, and I mean bathed, brushed, saddled, foot covers on, chest piece, bridle on, hair braided, hooves painted, everything. Once my horse was ready she would bring it by the gate, I would get on and go do my pattern, once I was done I would jump off and get back in the car. Even doing all that I would still get itchy, a runny nose, puffy eyes, drowsy, breakout in hives, and sneeze every 10 seconds. No allergy pill was helping at this point, and it was becoming nearly impossible. Due to my allergies, and how busy my life was becoming as I got older we decided to sell my horse. We ended up selling him to my trainer, who still currently has him.

Ok ok, done being side tracked now, that itself was a blog post probably haha! Here is the picture I found of the Pinterest one... 

Now lets finally get around to the tutorial part, so you can try it!

I went to my local Ace Hardware (like a Home Depot / Lowes) and had them cut me a 2.5 foot piece of wood and bought a horseshoe. I  than brought them home and sanded the edges of my board and put a light coat of stain on it. The stain I used was MINEWAX, color Early American. While that was drying I went onto Microsoft Word and found a font like I liked. Once I found the font I enlarged it so each letter was on its own page (size 72 for me). You can scale it according to the size of your board too. I printed the letters off and checked to see if the board was dry yet. The board ended up taking an additional 30 minutes, 45 minutes total to completely dry. 

You than take a pencil (not mechanical) and trace the outside of the letters, on the back side. Make sure you do not do it on the front (side with ink) or the letters will be backwards. You will need to do this fairly dark so there is enough to transfer onto the board. Be careful touching it after you trace it, to avoid smudging.

Once you have traced the outline of all of the letters you will want to space them out evenly on the board, including the horseshoe U. Once they are spaced out to your liking you will want to tape down the papers. Once the papers are taped on you will nail in the horseshoe with flat top nails. I put 2 nails per side, one at the very top and one at the very bottom. I did it that way so it wouldn't tilt and was very secure. 

You than get the same pencil and scribble over the letter on the front side. This will imprint what you did on the back side onto the board. 

(^^^ I know this is very faint, but this shows what it will look like once transferred over.)

At this point all you have to do now is paint inside the letters on the board. The color I used for my board was BEHR - Eggshell Creme left over from my  DIY - Stencil Table. Here is my final project! I cannot wait to put this baby up when I have a house of my own.

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