Ever since I saw THIS post from Amy Christie, I have never looked at any common wooden household item the same.
I can’t help it. I must always ask…could I etch that? 🙂 Like these kid spoons I posted about here.
And…like these hangers…
I decided to make a couple of them “his and hers.”
And others “Mr. and Mrs.”
They would make a lovely handmade wedding present, don’t you think?
Throw in a gift card to a home store and you have a perfect marriage of sentimental handmade personality and useful practicality. Pun intended. 😉
Or…just make some for fun…with dots and hearts…
All you need are some wooden hangers and an wood burn tool or an etcher!
I got my hangers at Ikea for $4 for an 8 pack. My wood burn tool is from Michael’s years ago. I think it was $15 after coupon. A worthy investment that I have used many times already.
I’ll leave you with a few things to keep in mind when wood burning or etching:
– The tool gets extremely hot. Use caution the whole time it’s on and when it’s turned off but still cooling.
– Dots are the easiest design to manage. Any lines or words take a lot of patience. Go slowly. If you make a mistake there is no real way to “erase” it unless you rework your design. You can lightly mark out your design beforehand with a pencil if you feel more comfortable with that. Simply erase any remaining pencil marks after etching.
– Expect to smell like campfire when you’re done. You are, after all…burning wood. 😉
-This is a craft of patience. It bears repeating…go slowly. I sort of enjoy the still, quiet concentration it requires. It invites a nice change of pace to the day. 🙂
I love those! If I owned any wooden hangers I would be doing this RIGHT NOW…. I need to go to the store. =)
Thanks Charity!
What a fun idea!! And it would totally be a sweet wedding gift! 🙂 and yay for ikea and inexpensive wooden hangers, right?!
Totally! 😉
It’s such a good idea ! Now i want to go to Ikea… 😉
This is in no way meant to be a criticism – I love all your articles! But what you are using is a wood burner. Etching refers to a dremel (or I guess laser wood cutting too but that’s industrial, not DIY). Hope this helped!
No problem. In terms of general crafters, wood burner and wood etcher are used interchangeably. A quick google search will show that. I appreciate you making the distinction though. That google search mostly proves that we are getting lazy with using the proper terms. It never hurts to be more precise! 🙂 I will definitely be more cognizant of how I use the term in the future. Thanks!
I love it! In Mexico they use a very similar tool to draw or write on leather and it looks really cool!
I’ve been wanting to try it on leather! Thanks Nora. 🙂