Stars and Stripes – alaynascreations

We are all still in a patriotic mood aren’t we? After all, July isn’t over yet, and here in Utah festivities have begun for Pioneer Day on the 24th, which are celebrated much the same as the 4th of July with rodeos, parades, flags, and fireworks – and the town demolition derby! (small towns – gotta love ’em) I’m pretty much in Red, White, and Blue mode from Memorial Day until the first of August. So now seems like the perfect time to share our newly finished Stars and Stripes Corn Hole Boards.

Corn Hole isn’t necessarily a Utah thing. In fact, I had never heard of it until we moved to North Carolina, where it is very popular – so popular that when we were invited to a wedding, along with the dancing and the food, they also had a few Corn Hole boards set up. For all of you that may have needed an explanation of the game (as we did) Corn Hole is basically a beanbag toss-type yard game played individually or in teams. The rules are pretty simple and so is the set up, so of course it wasn’t long before my husband wanted to try to build his own set of boards (they are pretty pricey to buy, especially custom ones). And once they were built, he very quickly wanted to improve them LOL. We ended up with three sets, two of which we left with friends in NC when we moved and brought one of the unfinished sets with us across country.

They sat in the garage until the end of June when the husband insisted that we try to finish them to use at our big family BBQ on the 4th of July. I did finish them all right – but then we forgot to load them up and take them with us to the BBQ! (haha – still shaking my head at that one) I am determined that they will get used this summer – really they will! But until I follow through with that, I may as well show them off here on the blog, right?!

Typically the boards have some sort of theme like sports teams or colleges, etc. The husband may have been into that but it’s not anything I truly have a preference for (and no, I did not want to make a Dale Jr NASCAR one LOL) so I went with the Stars vs Stripes. Not only did that seem like a good fit for us as a military family, but it allowed me to use one of my favorite finishing techniques – masking off the design before staining so it becomes part of the item instead of an applied accessory.

Isn’t that pretty? I like the contrast between the two wood colors and though the shapes can be seen clearly, the stain does bleed a tiny bit which gives it more of a hand-made distressed or vintage look. And look – I even threw together a quick tutorial so you can try out the technique too!

Easy right?! And such a pretty final product. I have also used the stain technique on some decorative quote boards (see one of my favorites HERE) and love the result. You just have to be sure the lettering or shapes aren’t too thin or too tiny or the stain will go under the edges too easily. I cut the vinyl stars myself using my Silhouette machine, but if you don’t have access to one of those it wouldn’t take long to hand cut the starts using self-adhesive vinyls sheets from the craft store.

I did finish them off with a few coats of spray Polycrylic which gives them a nice finish and should hold up if we accidentally leave them outside in a rainstorm. For anyone that is interested, the plans we used for official measurements to build the boards can be found on this website. As always, if you do try out the boards or the stain technique I would love to see your creations so feel free to drop me a comment or an email.

Oh – one other thing (this may be kind of an important one! lol) The official set up and rules for a Corn Hole game can be found on this site.

There. Now we’re all ready to play. Who’s going to challenge my husband to the first game? 😉

Interested in other great tips for Inexpensive Summer Fun with the Kids, great ideas for getting together with friends and using your new corn hole boards like my Splash Bash water party, or check out some great Summer Themed Gift Baskets under $25 along with the other recent posts on my blog!