Patriotic USA Door Hanger That’s Perfect for Summer!

See how to make this patriotic USA door hanger that’s perfect for summer!

Display some cute American pride on your front door from Memorial Day through the Fourth of July all the way to Labor Day!

 

Patriotic USA Door Hanger That’s Perfect for Summer!

By now, y’all know how I love me some wreaths. Just check out my Project Gallery to see all the ones I’ve made so far.

I seemed to already have ones for nearly every holiday or time of year (even for UK basketball season)…except summer.

I know. Crazy, indeed.

I’ve since rectified this decor dilemma with my newly created patriotic USA door hanger!

Now we can proudly display this American flag-esque beauty on our door from May through July all the way until Labor Day…or possibly even year-round (I mean, I am married to an Army vet so we’re all about American pride in these parts).

 

Supplies:

Here’s what I used to make this patriotic USA door hanger:

• Unpainted wooden cutout of USA
  • There are lots of different options here too
• Painter’s tape
• Red & white spray paints
• Silhouette Cameo and a 12″ x 24″ cutting mat
• Navy blue vinyl
• Hook tool
• Transfer paper
• Twine
• Glue
• Scissors

 

Painting the Wooden USA Cutout White

I first gave the entire wooden map a couple coats of white spray paint, giving it a light sanding with some fine sand paper in between coats, just to make sure it stayed nice and smooth.

 

Adding Painter’s Tape & Painting Red Stripes

Then it was time to paint the red stripes.

I first applied a few rows of painter’s tape where I wanted the white stripes to remain, making sure to cover the edges really well too.

Then I gave the whole map a couple light coats with the red paint.

 

Removing Painter’s Tape

Once the paint was dry, I started to remove the painter’s tape.

And just like with my dual-sided Valentine’s Day door hanger and the bright and bold accent wall in my son’s room, I had nothing but crisp, clean lines!

Along the edges, there were a few spots where the red paint had blown onto the white stripe areas (I obviously didn’t cover them so well…whoops!).

I just sprayed some of the white paint onto a paper plate and did some minor touch-ups with a small craft brush. No biggie.

 

The Navy USA Vinyl Design

Now that my map was done in the red and the white, I needed to add the blue!

The idea for this whole project started on Pinterest (of course) when I saw this gorgeous card kit by Julie Campbell with “The United States of America” in a wonderfully swirly script font.

And since she’s offering it as a FREE cut file, I knew I had to create something with it! I mean, it’s just too beautiful.

It’s also apparently based on a design by Jude Landry, and you can get it on a shirt from his site too.

Since I’d be cutting out the design with my Silhouette Cameo, I first took a screenshot of my map’s shape from the website where I purchased it so I could create a mockup that was to scale.

Then I opened it up in Silhouette Studio along with the cut file of the wording.

I then resized the text to fit my map and adjusted its proportions a tad so it would look right, then resized everything to the final dimensions before cutting it out.

 

Silhouette Cameo Vinyl Cut Settings:

Now that my door hanger was painted and my design was finished, it was time to cut it out in vinyl using my Silhouette Cameo.

I flipped through my vinyl storage organizer until I spotted a 12″ x 24″ sheet of navy blue vinyl and pulled it out, along with my 12″ x 24″ cutting mat.

I used the default Vinyl cut settings but bumped the speed down a bit since this had some pretty intricate parts:

• Speed: 5
• Thickness: 9
• Blade: 2
• Cutting Mat: Checked

 

Cutting The Vinyl

The sheet of navy vinyl was placed on the cutting mat and then loaded into my Silhouette Cameo.

Once I double-checked that my blade was set to a depth of 2, I went back to my computer and hit ‘Cut’…then watched the magic happen!

 

Weeding The Vinyl

A few minutes later, I had a perfect vinyl design. Wahoo! I just love it when that happens.

Next, I grabbed my hook tool and started weeding (or removing) all the excess vinyl away until…

 

…I had just the beautiful design left!

 

Applying the Vinyl Design

To apply the design to my freshly-painted wooden map, I first added some transfer paper over top then used the fail-proof hinge method.

You can read more details about it here if you’d like…it is pretty amazing.

After that, all that remained was gluing a strand of twine to the back for hanging and this beauty was FINISHED!

 

The Completed Patriotic USA Door Hanger!

And here it is!

I just love how this USA door hanger turned out!

It makes me feel so incredibly patriotic, and it all came together really quickly too (those types of projects are the best).

Now we can show off our American pride with this cute and unique decoration adorning our front door. It’s just perfect for summer!

 

I also used this same cut file for an all-American shirt for my son!

 

More Patriotic Fun!

Here are some other All-American goodies I’ve shared!

 

 

 

You Might Also Enjoy….

If you enjoyed this, make sure you check out all my other wreaths/door hangers and Silhouette projects in my Project Gallery, and also join me over on Pinterest!

 

Thanks so much for stopping by!