DIY Wooden Disney Attraction Signs

One’s home can never be sprinkled with enough Disney magic. I know previously we covered Small Ways to Add Disney to your Home but this is something a little more custom. This past Christmas I set out to make some signs for my mother of her favorite things at Disney, since she was hunting for some Disney items to add to her new office.  I thought these DIY Wooden Disney Attraction Signs would be a perfect fit. The hardest part of this project is deciding what to do; once you start, you will realize how many attractions, restaurants, hotels and entertainment are your favorites and how do you leave some out?

 

Supplies Needed:

• Wood
• Sanding Paper
• Acrylic Paint
• Paint Brushes
• Permanent Adhesive Vinyl
• Picture Hangers
• Cricut Machine

Step One Wood Preparation

We have seen other examples of these attraction signs on Etsy and they use 1 by 4 inch wood. A 1 by 4 inch board is actually only 3 1/2 inches wide, so we opted for 1 by 6 inch boards, which are 5 1/2 inches wide. We bought boards that were six feet long and cut them into 12, 14 and 16 inch lengths. Once we started, we did decide to add some restaurants and entertainment on the smaller width boards, to give some variety. The next step was to lightly sand them to take the rough edges off. This is the step that we decided to get everyone in the family involved in the process!

 

 

Step Two Board Painting

First thing first, it’s best with bare wood to prime it first. Otherwise, you will end up using a ton of coats of your color which is far more expensive than your Kilz primer. I found that two coats of primer applied with a small foam roller seemed to put a good base coat down. We then found that most boards were easily covered with two coats of the final color. Unless you have a large supply of various paint colors, I suggest taking pictures of your favorite attractions with you to the big box craft store to get the perfect colors. It also helps to have your coupons or wait for that 10 for $10 on acrylic paint sale. We never used a full bottle of any one color, even after the 23 signs we made!

I found that working like an assembly line seemed to work best. I worked with nine or ten boards at a time and I could put on each coat in about 15 minutes to all the boards – cleaning the paint brush between each color was almost equal to the paint time! Do all the priming at once and then all the final colors at once.

Artwork for the Circut

We are going to give you three attractions 100% FREE. So you can sign up for our email list and get these three files sent to you to use on your Cricut machine and make these signs at home.

Haunted Mansion Cut File

Soarin’

Expedition Everest

Applying the Permanent Vinyl

You first need to remove all the vinyl that isn’t part of your design. Then you use the clear transfer sheet to lift off the vinyl from the sheet that was cut. Next, using the rubbing tool, you apply the vinyl to your board. Depending on how detailed your designs are, you will probably do this two or three times to layer the different color vinyl to make your finished design. You will be surprised how fast your signs come to life!

In order to reduce costs on this project, I actually ordered a bulk mixed pack of matte vinyl and glossy so I had options. However, we mostly ended up going with the matte colors.

---

Do you own a Cricut? Share in the comments below your Disney projects I am always looking for something new to make! While these signs were a rather lengthy process the end result was well worth all the hard work!