Tutorial: How to Make a Handpainted Christmas Countdown! (Advent Calendar)

Every fall I find myself immersed deep in the world of Holiday crafting. A chalkboard Christmas countdown is a simple craft that even the beginner crafter can pull off successfully. The materials are pretty inexpensive and the project can be completed in just a few hours! I've decided to share a step-by-step for those of you DIY'ers who need a little help through your crafting.  And for those of you anti-crafters out there (don't worry, I know you exist...), you can head on over to my etsy shop to purchase one that I have already finished!

Materials needed:
wooden plaque (Hobby Lobby, Michaels, etc...)
black, white, red, green acrylic paints
chalkboard paint
pencil
gesso
flat paint brush
small, round paint brush

Optional materials:
painter's Tape (I used wavy Frogtape)
gel medium varnish/mod podge gloss finish

The first thing to do is to prepare your painting surface. Occasionally, the wood needs to be sanded down a bit to remove any rough parts on the surface. Next, I apply a coat of gesso to the front and back. Gesso helps to create a smooth, paint-able surface.

Next, paint the base coat. For this project my base stripe was white, so I painted white paint over the gesso surface. When the base coat is dry, you can start to apply your painter's tape. (If you are not using painter's tape, use a pencil to lightly draw your stripes across the surface.)

Once the tape has been applied smoothly, begin to paint the red stripes. Allow the paint to dry thoroughly before removing your tape!
At this point, you can draw the oval that you will be painting with chalkboard paint. For mine, I cut an oval out of paper and traced it onto the board. Now, paint the area with two coats of chalkboard paint, allowing the first coat to dry before painting the second.

At this point, I painted the edges. First, paint the green stripe, being careful not to get paint on your freshly-painted striped surface. Lastly, paint the black stripe.

Now that the chalkboard paint has had time to dry, you can paint the border around it. I used a flat paintbrush to paint the alternating green and red stripes. Now it is time to paint the words onto your project. The easiest way for a beginner to paint letters is to print the words out from a computer and transfer them onto the board. You can do this using graphite paper, or by lightly shading the back of your paper with pencil and then tracing over the letters onto the board (I know you remember this from elementary school!) I painted my letters using a small, round paintbrush and black acrylic paint. Another option would be to draw them on using a black paint pen, or by using vinyl letter stickers. 

Last, I painted a clear coat of gloss over the entire sign, except for the chalkboard center. This just creates a seal, or top coat, over your painted project. It's not really necessary if you do not have the material, but the gloss will give your project a nice shine. *Note about using gloss: It will look white and milky when you paint it over your project. Don't panic! It will dry clear, I promise! You're done! 

Now, it is time to decide how to hang your project so that you can start counting down until Christmas!  There are a couple ways that you can do this.  One, is to add magnets to the back using a hot glue gun.  Then, you can hang your countdown on the refrigerator!
Another option is to add a claw tooth picture frame hanger on the back so that you can hang the plaque on the wall like a picture.