I found this 'Family' plaque at Dollar Tree- unpainted, and I used good old acrylic paint- the kind you get in a bottle for under a dollar. I painted it a sage green then used crackling medium and a cream colored paint over that. I think the brand for the crackling medium was DecoArt- it's inexpensive, and I found it with the sealers and such in the paints area of the craft store. I have to say that before I tried crackling medium, I was a bit unsure of how to use it. So, after much procrastination, I took a deep breath, read the directions on the bottle, and found out it's pretty basic. You get a couple of contrasting colors of paint- the darker one usually looks best underneath, the lighter one crackles and shows streaks of the darker. Paint your project with the darker color then let dry completely. Brush your crackling medium on. The trick is to not let it dry completely, so you have to keep checking on it, until it feels tacky. You then carefully brush your lighter coat of paint in the same direction as the brush strokes you used for the crackling medium. It begins to crackle with a couple of minutes. After it is completely dry, you can add a clear coat of sealer if you'd like- I don't generally, but it depends on how much touching it's going to get. Then I just used ribbon and buttons to decorate it. I'm giving it to my best buddy, and since I bought 2 of them, I need to work on one for myself too. Maybe this will give you a new outlook towards Dollar Tree craft items. I'm glad I gave it a chance.
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