Hints of warmer days are coming, Daylight Savings changes have come – and I am doing a little bit of sprucing and zhushing around the house. And one of my favorite places to start is on my mantel.

I had a desire for a black and white graphic image for this spot to pull things together – so I made my own. And you can too – and it is super easy. What you need is a canvas, a Sharpie paint pen ( I ended up not using the Decor Color one – just the Sharpie), a pencil (and have a sharpener near by), tape and a print out of your desired image. I found my biker silhouette image at the Graphics Fairy. Something about men on bikes says spring to me. Possibly strange, I realize.

Once your image is pieced together with tape (if the canvas is larger than one sheet of paper), use your pencil to fill in color in the back.

Once finished, flip your image over and tape it in place. Trace out your whole image using pressure with your pencil. This will cause the image to trace from the lead on the back of the paper.

Then fill it all in with your black paint pen. I actually knew going into it that this would be somewhat of a complicated image to create because there is a lot of overlap and detail. But I went for it anyway because I love the image and unless someone is inspecting it, they can’t see that it is not perfect. And let’s face it – if someone is inspecting it for perfection, you should probably ask them to leave!

If I had chosen a simpler image, it could be completed in about 15 minutes. This one took me more like 35 minutes. But either way, custom art for your home in that short of a period of time is good by me.

And now I have a little more black and white in my room which I am loving.

What image would you choose? The Graphics Fairy has quite a few silhouette images. I am thinking I might be doing something with this rabbit silhouette soon. What would you do? And if you want some more ideas for sprucing up your home and your mantel, I am sharing some more thoughts over at Wayfair. Thanks so much for reading and wishing you a great day!

March 12, 2014 — Laura Putnam