Getting Crafty: DIY Initial Plate

I am thoroughly enjoying my 3 day weekend!  Thank you, Martin Luther King, Jr! Adam and I started things off with some breakfast at IHOP this morning.  We haven't been there in a while.

 It was fun to get out and enjoy such a pretty day with him.  After we had some breakfast, we went to my FAVORITE local shop (The United Gift Shop) and did some browsing.  Adam and I love to go in there and look around at all the vintage and antique things.  It's obviously not something he would do in his own spare time, but we always have a good time together just talking and walking around.  While we were there, I came across this little plate that I loved.  It had a verse on it that is very near to mine and Adam's hearts right now. 

So we picked it up for $4.00.  Normally I would only pay $2.00 at most for a smaller sized plate, but with the verse I was willing to pay more.  The center of the plate is blank, but I had a plan for it!  I have been looking for a plate that I could put mine and Adam's initials on.  I saw a project on Pinterest that I have been dying to try found HERE.

To do this, I used one of the napkins from our wedding. The groom's napkins were black with white initals, and the bride's napkins were white with black initials.  I had 2 different fonts in the bride napkins since there was an error by the printing company who ordered them.  They ordered the wrong font (the block font), so they had to re-order it in the cursive font.  We got all of the block font napkins for free.

I decided to go with the cursive fancy font because it is bigger and would take up more of the blank space on the plate.  To do this project, here are the materials I used.

Plate, small craft brush, decopauge, scissors, and an inital napkin. 

First, I hand washed the plate so I could make sure that I had a clean, smooth surface to work with.  Next, I unfolded the napkin out like so.

Then, I peeled back the top layer of the napkin that had the monogram ink on it.

Don't rush when you are peeling back the napkin, otherwise it will tear.  When you're done, you will be left with this.  I just cut out the square of the top layer.

Next, I cut as closely as possible around our initials.

Then, I was ready to decopauge it to the center of the plate.

I should really get a manicure.....j/k.  That's my lovely hubby assistant. :)  I was going to let him hold it down while I started decoupaging, but I decided it would be better to spread the decopauge on the back first, then lay it down and decopauge over it.  So that's what I did. Here it is wet.  You can't tell that much that the napkin is whiter than the plate.  The plate was really more of a cream or off-white.

And here it is all dry!  I need to get a small plate stand for it.  It's going to go in the kitchen I believe.

I really like it!  Since I already had all of the supplies on hand, this project only cost me $4.00.  (Thank you to my parents who bought the napkins for the wedding!)  I'm sure you could do this same project using Word on your computer and then print off your initals in whatever font you would like.  It would also look good with a plain plate, or you could decorate your plate how you like.  I'll let you see it when I have it on the stand in its home.  Thanks for reading!