Rustic Reindeer Plaque

I found really cute wooden reindeer silhouettes at Michael's and loved the Rustic touch of the metal holly near the antlers so I picked up a couple to play with. I'm loving the rustic and shabby chic decor styles, so I thought it would be fun to use a really dark stain on this and paint the holly with some red and green mixed with a dark brown to make it just barely stain the metal.

I used a Walnut color water-base stain since that's what I had on hand and inexpensive acrylic paint. I chose to use a cheap brush I was going to throw away since I wanted to give it an uneven stain that looked a bit blotchy, but I ended putting multiple coats on the face so I should have used a better brush.

 I started by lightly brushing on the stain but I wasn't really liking how it was turning out.

 I added more stain to the head of the reindeer and I liked that look a lot better.  I left a light streaky coat on the antlers so they appear lighter. 

Holly with Walnut stain

Holly with acrylic paint mixed with Walnut stain

I also painted a coat of the stain on the metal holly accent so I could mix with paint to give the red and green of the holly a brown vintage tint.

 I painted the sides of the antlers with the same walnut stain to give it a border if you look at it from an angle, let it dry then hung it from the wall.  Overall I'm happy with how it turned out, but I may do some further tweaking to add a bit more green to the holly and distress the wood and add imperfections to make it look even more rustic and old.

 

I'm linking up to these great sites, make sure you check them out:

I Heart Nap Time

Classy Clutter
Six Sisters Stuff
Be Different Act Normal
504 Main
Young and Crafty
It's So Very Cheri
Three Mango Seeds
Setting For Four
The Country Chic Cottage