Customizing Art with a Handcrafted Frame

When we were at the pet store picking up dog food just before Christmas, we stumbled on some wall prints that we thought were pretty cute. The company that makes them is called Northern Mutt.

The first one I saw said, "My dog doesn't do floors" and the dog in the picture looked just like my aunt's dog, Desi. Perfect Christmas present. Once I started reading them all I knew we had to buy some for ourselves. We picked out, "Home is where the dog is", and "Life is better with a dog".

They were a little plain and flat on their own though, so we decided to build frames to beef them up. We spent an afternoon in the garage working out the sizing and trying out different router bits to get an edge we liked. But after a few hours we couldn't come to an agreement on the outside edge.

We took a break to pick up some supplies at Home Depot with a quick pit stop at Target to return something, and while at Target I wandered around the picture frame section and found one I loved - wide and flat with a raised outer edge. I dragged Tom away from the electronics department and he admitted he liked it too - and that he could replicate it. With a new plan and fresh boards he whipped them up in no time.

As usual I was responsible for puttying, sanding, staining, and waxing. For some reason I didn't take pictures of my aunt's frame. It's too bad too, because I tried something a little different. After staining the wood I wasn't happy with how uneven it was - should have used wood conditioner, I know - so I gave it a light coat of brown paint, waited a few minutes, and wiped off the areas that were too dark. It still looked stained, not painted, but the colour was rich and even. I gave the frame two coats of dark wax and buffed it to a shine.

For our own frames I stained them and then went over the stain with a very light coat of greyish paint, wiping it off right away. Two coats of wax and a buff.

Here they are all framed up. Isn't that better? Tom wants to buy more now.

We haven't quite decided where we're going to hang them - definitely in the basement, maybe behind the bar.

These framed pictures truly express how we feel about our dogs - they are our world. And I'm pretty sure that we are theirs, too. Is there anything better than a happy dog?

~~~~~