DIY Fall Painted Signs Made With Scrap Wood and Chalk Paints

DIY Fall Painted Signs Are Easy and Simple To Make

Have you seen all these super cute wooden signs at craft and home décor stores? These painted wooden signs are so popular in home décor right now, especially since everyone has jumped on the Joanna Gaines farmhouse style bandwagon! And let me just say that I sure hope farmhouse style doesn’t go “out” anytime soon because I am on that bandwagon too! But did you know that you can make your own DIY fall painted signs from cheap scrap wood?

You can avoid paying high prices for signs by making your own. If you are a DIY crafter and painter like me you may have tons of supplies laying around to use for this project. I have three signs that I’ll share with you that I made from cheap wood and paint! So easy and really so much fun to make your own signs rather than buy them. Check out this post on how to make your own DIY Fall Welcome Sign

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Project Supplies

Scrap Wood – various sizes, depending on what you desire

Chalk Paints in various colors

Paint Brushes – chalk paint brushes and some fine art brushes for lettering

Printed Letters and Elements for tracing

Paint Pens (optional) – I recommend regular paint pens, not the chalk paint pens

Sealer or TopCoat Product – I use Dixie Belle ClearCoat Satin

How To Make Your Own DIY Fall Painted Signs

Step 1

Decide what size your sign will be. I made three signs. The first one is a Large porch welcome sign. You can read more about that here in this post. My second sign is a square sign that measures 17.5 inches by 17.5 inches. My third sign is a rectangular sign made from scrap 1×6 board that I used for another woodworking project . I cut the length as 28 inches.

Step 2

Once you have you wood or plywood boards cut to the size desired, sand them down a little if need to remove any rough edges. Then you can wipe down to clean with some water to remove dust. Use a little dish soap and water or Dixie Belle White Lightening cleaner if it is super dirty.

Step 3

Next paint it. Decide what your base sign color will be and paint or stain it. I prefer to use chalk style paints because they dry really fast and they work well with other paint products and topcoats. If you use a oil based gel stain then you have to let it dry for 72 hours before using other water-based products with them.

For the base color of my signs I wanted fall colors so I used Dixie Belle Terracotta on my long FALL sign. I used Dixie Belle Coffee Bean on my “It’s Fall Y’all” leaf square sign. I love Dixie Belle Terracotta, Coffee Bean, and Colonel Mustard for fall colors.

DIY Fall Painted Signs picture of letters printed being traced onto a piece of wood painted terracotta color

piece of wood painted in coffee bean with a container of Dixie Belle coffee bean chalk paint and a paint brush

Step 4

Decide what your sign will say. You can certainly use stencils if you have them that say the wording you want. Use Canva or Google Docs to create a printed letter, wording or element that you can trace onto your project. I prefer canva.com and they do have a free option for membership. However, if that’s too tricky to use try Google Docs. I suggest that you choose 8.5×11 size paper for the project size. That way you can print one letter or phrase per page and make it big enough to fit your sign boards.

Step 4 Part A

Next I searched for the font I wanted. I chose a font called Lemonada Semi Bold. It’s one of my favorite fonts. I typed my first letter in the text box and then just stretched it to fit the letterhead size. I printed a test copy to make sure it was the size I wanted. to determine the size of each letter, I measured the space vertically where I planned to place the letters and then divided by the number of letters. This determined the average height of each letter. Then I copied that page for each remaining letter, changing the text to finish spelling out my word of choice. for my 1×6 sign I spelled out “FALL”. I also spelled out the work element in a different font in smaller sign to place at the top of my 1×6 sign.

Step 4 Part B

Next I found an element I liked. Canva is fun because you can search for an element in the search bar. So if you search “fall” or “leaf” it will pull up all of the elements that you could choose from. Some elements are free and some available only to Canva Pro users or for a small fee if not a Canva Pro user. I found a leaf element that looked simple to trace but really cute. Once you find the element you like, size it to your needs and print.

Terracotta painted wood with letter being traced from a printed paper

Step 4 Part C

Next, place the printed letters and elements down on my projects, placing them where I want them and trace the outline with a pencil or pen pressing down hard enough to make an indention in the wood. After they are traced you can then use paint pens to fill them in or use chalk pain with an small art detail brushes to fill in your letters and elements.

On my square sign, I traced a large felt leaf stencil that I found at Dollar Tree. After I traced it I used an art brush and two colors of chalk paint to trace so that just the outline of the leaf is on the sign. I then wrote over it using a paint pen to say “Happy Fall Y’all”.

Terracotta sign with traced letters spelling "FALL" and a brown painted leaf

DIY Fall Leaf Traced Sign p a picture of square sign painted in brown with a leaf traced onto it

DIY Fall Painted Signs picture of brown sign with paintbrush applying paint to a leaf traced pattern with yellow paint

DIY Fall Painted Leaf Tracing Sign sign is square painted brown with burlap rope hanger and it says happy fall ya'll

Step 5

Once your chalk paint is dry and you are happy with your signs you can use a topcoat if desired to protect your work. I use Dixie Belle Clear Coat in Satin. Dixie Belle Gator Hide is great waterproof topcoat if you plan on having your sign outdoors in the weather. I used Dixie Belle Gator Hide on my DIY Fall Porch Welcome Sign.

Fall sign-terracotta sign with brown leaf and a container of clearcoat

Step 6

Add further embellishments if desired to your signs. You can certainly hot glue elements onto your signs like bows and ribbons etc. For my square “Happy Fall Y’all” sign I drilled two small holes in the top and made a burlap ribbon hanger. Add any elements you desire.

Fall Mantle Decorations - showing two fall signs and a white brick mantel with fall decorations

Summary: Making Your Own DIY Fall Painted Signs Is Fun And Easy!

As you can see making your own DIY Fall Chalk painted signs is not only easy but so fun. And honestly in my opinion it always feels good to make something yourself. And if you have scrap wood leftovers from other DIY projects, it’s a good way to recycle some supplies rather than wasting!

You can find so many ideas and inspiration for fall signs and décor on Pinterest. I’d love for you to give me a follow on Pinterest! You can find me at https://www.pinterest.com/simplyrefinished/ and I’d love to see your fall signs in the comments below or tag me on Instagram when you share them. I’m at https://www.instagram.com/simplyrefinishedfurniture/.