Wire Nail Michigan Map Art

My friend, Pam, is moving from Michigan to Minnesota this week. I love having her live down the street from me and although I am excited and happy for her I am sad for me and really going to miss her.

I wanted to make her something to remind her of the Mitten State and all of her friends and family here as a going away present. After thinking about it for a bit I came up with this idea to make a map of Michigan with wire nails and embroidery thread.

To start, I took a 12" x 12" piece of 1/4" plywood and spray painted it black. I then downloaded a map of Michigan from the internet and resized the image so it was approximately 8" x 8". I taped the paper to my plywood and then hammered wire nails (3/4 x 18 size) into the plywood following the map outlines. Due to the spacing I used some of the map detail was inevitably lost (sorry, Old Mission Peninsula!) but it still is unmistakably the Mitten State.

Once I had completed the wire nail outline I gently ripped the paper from around the nails. I think the nails alone look pretty neat and may use that for another project sometime. 

With the paper removed it was time to start adding the embroidery thread. I tied a knot on one of the nails and then started looping the thread around each nail. I learned the hard way that you have to keep the thread taut at all times otherwise you run the risk of the thread coming off the last few nails. I went around the outline three times with the thread before tying it off. I dabbed a little Fray Check on the knots to make sure they wouldn't come undone and then snipped the tails once the Fray Check had dried.

Pam really enjoyed the gift and I like how it turned out so much that I think I am going to make something for my house using some sort of variation of this.