Easy Valentine's Day Decor - Conversation Heart!

I normally don’t do a lot of decorating for Valentine’s Day, but I was at the Dollar Tree and I saw this plain wooden heart, and I instantly thought it would be cute painted to look like a conversation heart!

For those not familiar, conversation hearts are those small, pastel, heart shaped candies, with sayings like “Be Mine” and “Love You” printed on them.

This project was so easy. It took me around 30 minutes to complete (not including drying time). And the cost was $5, and that’s only because I had to buy paint. And I still have paint left to use for other projects.

Supplies and Equipment needed

Cricut, or other die cutting machine to make the stencil
Wood cut out heart
pastel paint
red or fuschia paint
paint brushes (I used sponge brushes)
contact paper
mask

I wanted the hearts to have a flat finish, so I used chalk paint. I picked up this light pink chalk paint at Walmart. If you already have pastel paint, but its not flat or matte, you could either just use it as is (the paint really doesn’t need to be matte or flat) or you could put a coat of matte Mod Podge on the heart after you are done painting it.

While the paint was drying, I used my Cricut and created the stencil out of clear contact paper. The font I used was Arial. I wanted a slim san-serif font like the one on the candies. I applied the stencil using a piece of the Cricut mask.

Then, I used a sponge “pouncer” to apply the fuschia paint to the heart but you could use a regular sponge brush, or maybe even a paper towel wadded up and dipped in the paint. To make the letters look more like the printed on letters on the candy, I didn’t worry to much about complete coverage. This is one project where being a little sloppy makes the project look better. If you look closely, you can still see the light pink showing through some areas of the letters.

Carefully remove the stencil, and let dry for about 15 minutes or so. I used some thin ribbon that I already had for the hanger, but it would have still been cute with the twine hanger that it came with.