DIY Project: Dominoes!

Here's a fun DIY project I recently made for a dear friend's birthday (but I haven't given to her yet so don't tell Carrie). I originally found this project through A Beautiful Mess, which linked from Aesthetic Outburst. The tutorial on there is great, but I thought what the heck I'll make my own.

What You'll Need:

• Wood (I used a couple pine trim pieces, measuring 2"x36"x3/4")
• Chop Saw
• Sandpaper
• Pencil
• Metal Ruler
• Puff Paint (found at any craft store)

The first step is to take your wood and cut it into domino sized pieces. I cut them into 1" thick pieces, but there was a whole learning process to this. First off, we didn't have the right saw blade and it kept ripping up the ends of the pieces.

{Blech}

Instead of going out and dropping $70 on a new blade I improvised. Each piece ended up being cut twice. 1/2 way through on one side, flip the piece and then finish the cut. It took me about twice as long as I had planned, but each cut was nice and clean. And that made me happy. For the set you need 29 pieces, I cut a couple extra just in case.

After all your pieces are cut you're going to want to sand the ends and edges (no one likes getting splinters). I used 120 grit sandpaper because that's what I had laying around. Make sure you use a damp cloth to wipe off all the dust before you start painting.

Measure the halfway mark on each piece and (in pencil) lightly draw a line across.

Using the puff paint make a dotted line across the pencil line. I don't have a very steady hand so I practiced on some extra pieces before I started on the 'good' ones.

Once the paint dried I used this chart provided by Aesthetic Outburst to mark all the dots on each piece and coloured them in using the puff paint.

The puff paint takes about 6 hours to dry so I made sure to put them in an out of the way place where the cat couldn't get to them. I'm super happy with how they turned out and think these would make a great gift for almost anyone.

{Love the detail of the woodgrain}

Now I just need to sew a little bag to hold them...and remember how to play!

Cost Breakdown:

• 2 pieces of pine trim - $3.50 each from Lowe's
• White Puff Pain - $2.50 from De Serre's
• TOTAL: $10 (for a handmade {heartfelt} present)