silhouette sunday: using tattoo paper to make artisan wood signs

If you're past your teens, I bet you never imagined using temporary tattoos again. Gone are the days where you could find them in vending machines but you know what you can do? Use your cutting machine to make them!

Now, Silhouette Temporary Tattoo paper is slightly more costly than I remember these embellishments costing... however, you can use them for so much more! Including what I'm showing you today: putting printed images onto wood signs.

For this tutorial, I grabbed a reclaimed wood plank. You can sand and apply whatever kind of stain you want for this project.

Note: If you're planning on applying any vinyl over your image, it might be best to skip the stain. I stained (not thinking it would affect the adhesion of the tattoo paper) and had to be very careful when pulling my transfer tape up with this project. Just proceed with caution!

For the tattoo part, you'll want to mirror your image before printing. Then, according to the directions I printed the image on the slightly shiny side and peeled the plastic film away from the green backing paper. The sticky side goes onto the ink side of the paper.

Once this is done, you can either cut around the shapes with your cutting machine or opt to use scissors. It really just depends on your design and how you're going to finish your wood later on.




Apply the tattoo to the wood like you would on human skin. Be sure to apply enough pressure! This is what really helps the image stick to your wood.

When you can slide the top paper off the tattoo, the image is ready! You can use this for family photos, some clipart, or decorative stock photos. I chose some flowers to go with my quote that I was putting over it.



When you're done, you'll want to seal the tattoo with at least a layer of Mod Podge or something close to it. Then, you can choose to leave it the way it is or add some extra touches to make it really stand out.

On my sign, I used my new font Rosegarden to give this sign a handwritten look without having to hand write it. You can find this font (and 3 others!) in my new font bundle.

I hope you liked this tutorial and that it inspired you to get crafty with wood transfers!