Pallet Art

I've seen a lot of pallet art on the internet lately, and some of it is really cute. I knew I wanted to make something, but I didn't have any pallets and I didn't really want to go to the trouble of pulling pallets apart if I could get my hands on some, so I used what I had on hand.
At the beginning of the summer, Dan put up a short fence around our garden area, so that our Great Dane/ Mastiff wouldn't ruin the garden. We didn't want the fence as tall as the rest of our fence, so Dan cut of the ends of a lot of pickets. When I saw the pile of discarded picket parts, I told him I wanted them.
Things got a bit busy, what with planting a garden, running around after the wilds ones, and having a baby, so I didn't get to the project until last week. I couldn't have done this project without my amazing husband's help, so I just want to start by thanking him for being a willing helper.
Dan cut the boards all to the same length. At first, I was planning to do the fruit of the Spirit, with each picket being a different fruit. However, when Dan informed me that each picket was about 5 inches wide, I thought that might end up being a bit bigger than I had planned for. So, I started trying to figure out a different verse I would like on the wall.  I ended up asking Dan if he would mind splitting the boards down the middle to be 2 1/2 inches instead, and coming up with an entirely different vision than what I had first had.
Because the pickets were cut down the middle, each one had a rough edge and a smooth edge, so I flipped them back and forth to make them all be rough edge to smooth edge, because I wanted them to look more like pallet wood put together.

I watered down craft paint, because I wanted it to look more like stain. I used that to paint the background a teal blue color.

Then I painted a sun in the corner mixing red and yellow. Finally, I used a pencil to sketch where I wanted my lettering to go, and then painted the letters on.

My painting helper- she got to paint the pickets that were too short for me to use

There are a couple parts I don't love how they turned out, but overall I like the effect.
Once I finished and knew the size I wanted, I asked Dan to cut me two boards long enough to span the rest of the boards.
I put wood glue across the two boards and placed each of the pickets on them.

Then I used a nail gun to nail the pickets to the board. I've used a lot of tools in my life- I grew up working in the shop with my dad- but I've never used a nail gun. It turns out it was easy, but I was still nervous I would accidentally shoot my finger with it or something!

The backside of my project

I still have more pickets left, so I'm trying to decide what else to do with them. This project was a lot of fun, and I was excited with how it turned out, so I'll definitely be making another one.
What is your favorite verse or hymn that you think I should use for my next project? I would really appreciate your ideas!

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