Dollar Tree Red Truck Gift Bag DIY Christmas Sign

Y’all know I love a good red Christmas truck DIY! Especially, one as affordable as this Dollar Tree Red Truck Gift Bag DIY Christmas Sign!

This Christmas DIY idea was so much fun to make, that I almost wish I had made it during a LIVE video on my Facebook page. 

I love the detailing of the red truck that I painted, and the red pom-pom trim goes with the other Christmas DIY decor I’ve been making for my home! I’m so excited to share with you how I brought this Dollar Tree gift bag DIY to life! 

Watch the tutorial

I didn’t record this project live, but I did make a quick, 3-minute tutorial video for you! It goes step by step and shows you the products I used and how I created each piece of this Dollar Tree Red Truck Gift Bag DIY Christmas Sign.

If you are a visual learner or want to see how I painted the adorable red truck, check out the DIY tutorial video! 

WATCH THE TUTORIAL

For this project, I will be using these items but you can substitute where you want.

“As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.”

• Dollar Tree Gift Bag
• Dollar Tree buffalo check fabric
• Apple Barrel White Acrylic Paint
• Apple Barrel Black Acrylic Paint
• Dollar Tree Wood Craft blocks
• Craft smart Red Acrylic Paint
• Apple Barrel Burnt Umber Acrylic Paint
• Dollar Tree buttons
• Dollar Tree wired garland
• Picture Frame
• Red Pom Pom Trim (Home Goods)
• Wood beads
• Jute Twine
• Glue Gun and Glue Sticks
• Heat gun
• Woodpile Slim Sticks (Hobby Lobby)
• Baby wipe
• Scissors 

Let’s get started

Step one is to remove the adorable red Christmas Truck, Merry Christmas, and Christmas Tree from the Dollar Tree gift bag. Be careful not to rip them when you are pulling the truck and tree off the bag.

Set the Christmas tree and Merry Christmas to the side. We will use those later. For the next step, you’re going to need the red Christmas truck.

If you didn’t get the bag that I did with the red truck, Merry Christmas, and Christmas Tree attached to the gift bag instead of just printed onto the paper, you can just cut the pieces out that you want to use and decoupage them on cardboard to make them sturdier. This is just another DIY idea for you. 

I love the railing on the bed of the red Christmas truck, but unfortunately, that was only part of the Dollar Tree gift bag’s printed design, and I couldn’t remove it. So, I made my own! 

I used Woodpile slim sticks from Hobby Lobby to recreate the railing on the bed of the truck. Stain 7 of the Woodpile slim sticks brown using Apple Barrel Burnt Umber Acrylic Paint.

Trim the curved ends off two of the slim sticks and hot glue them across the top of 5 slim sticks. It’s going to look kind of like a picket fence. Next, hot glue the bottom of the 5 slim sticks to the back of the red Christmas truck. 

Add some detailing

This next step is optional, but it was a must for me. I love a cute red Christmas truck, but I wanted mine to have a bit more detailing to look just a little more rustic and realistic.

So, I mixed a small bit of the Apple Barrel Black Acrylic paint with some Craft smart Red Acrylic paint and spread this across the truck.

This is going to be the base of the truck’s look and already makes it look more realistic. 

You want to have a very light hand to get this detailing perfect. Lightly outline where the door of the truck would be with black paint.

Then, spread the paint outward and brush it across the entire truck. This is going to give it kind of a rusted, aged look. 

Next, paint the hubcaps and the window of the truck completely black. Allow that to dry, mix a little bit of black paint with white paint, and paint a grey circle in the center of the hubcaps.

Then, use the grey paint to add the side mirror, door handle, and step bar at the bottom of the truck. 

Finally, use an artist’s brush to lightly brush white paint across the edges of the truck and the slim stick railing we made. This is going to give the truck a snowy look. 

The painting steps can be a little difficult to describe, so you can always watch the quick, 3-minute tutorial video I made to see in more detail how I got the red Christmas truck to look perfect! 

Oh, Christmas Tree!

Set your truck to the side to dry, and let’s work on the Christmas tree. Use the Christmas tree we removed from the Dollar Tree gift bag, and grab some Dollar Tree wired garland. 

To start, cut a piece of the garland to fit top to bottom on the gift bag Christmas tree. Next, cut smaller pieces of the wired garland and hot glue them coming off the middle piece of garland, covering the Christmas Tree cutout. 

This is going to make the Christmas tree look more realistic and dimensional and make it match the red truck much better.

Next, use the Apple Barrel White Acrylic Paint to flock the Christmas tree. Just lightly brush the paint across the pieces of Dollar Tree wired garland. 

Allow the DIY Christmas tree to dry, then hot glue it into place in the bed of the red Christmas truck, behind the slim stick railing. 

Decorate the frame

We are almost done! Before we can put everything together, we have to decorate the frame. I tried peeling the paper off the backing of the frame to remove the letters, but it was destroying the back of the frame, so I painted over the words with Apple Barrel Black Acrylic paint instead. 

I did this because otherwise, the black letters would have been visible through the white squares of the Dollar Tree buffalo check fabric. 

How to decoupage

First, cut a piece of the Dollar Tree buffalo check fabric to fit inside of the frame. Next, apply Mod Podge to the inside of the frame, where you want the fabric to stick. 

Carefully place the buffalo check fabric inside the frame. Be sure to smooth out any wrinkles or creases.

I like to put plastic saran wrap over the fabric that I’m decoupaging to prevent it from sticking to my fingers and peeling up when I am smoothing out the imperfections. 

While the decoupaged fabric is drying, let’s paint the frame. First, make grey paint by mixing Apple Barrel Black and White Acrylic Paints.

Use a paintbrush to apply the grey paint mixture to the face of the frame. Then, use a baby wipe to spread the white paint around the edges of the frame.

I know this is a technique that I haven’t really shown you before, but it works! 

You’ll notice that when you’re spreading the paint with a wet baby wipe, that the paint isn’t setting in an even coat. It almost looks kind of distressed. This is good! 

The frame already had the black base that you need to create a distressed or chippy look, so all we had to do was add the white paint!

The reason this technique works so well for this frame is that the frame is plastic and not wood like I typically use. 

So, our typical staining and distress method wouldn’t work here. The baby wipe spreads the white paint across the paper finish of the frame and allows it to dry with a washed look!

Hang it up

Now let’s make the hanger. I’m sure you aren’t shocked to know that I used jute twine and wood beads from Amazon to make the hanger for this DIY Christmas sign. (I mean, I use them a lot!) 

So, thread the beads onto the twine and cut the strip when the hanger is the length you want it to be. I used 14 wood beads for my hanger. 

Next, hot glue the ends of the twine to the back of the frame. To make it a little more sturdy, I hot glued a slim stick over each end of the jute twine. This is optional, but it makes the hanger more secure in my opinion. 

Bring it all together

It’s time to put all of our pieces together! I wanted this DIY Christmas craft to have a dimensional look, so I used Dollar Tree wood craft blocks to raise the painted gift bag truck and Merry Christmas sign. 

First, stain the craft blocks with the Apple Barrel Black Acrylic Paint, then hot glue them to the back of the painted red Christmas truck and Merry Christmas sign. 

Then, I hot glued the Dollar Tree gift bag red Christmas truck at the bottom of the frame and the Merry Christmas sign just above it. 

Cute as a button

I got that little jar of buttons from the Dollar Tree. It comes with an assortment of different sizes and colors of buttons. Pick two that match, and hot glue them onto the center of the white circle hubcaps. 

Of course, you could paint a small black circle for the hubcaps, but dimensional was my goal for this Christmas DIY idea, so I just had to use two cute little buttons! 

The finishing touches

I promise we are almost done! I felt like there was too much space above the Merry Christmas sign, so I just had to add the adorable Home Goods red pom pom trim! 

To make it fit perfectly, you’re going to hot glue it while still attached to the spool. So, pull the end over the edge of the frame and hot glue it into place. Then, unroll the spool and hot glue the pom pom trim to the other edge of the frame.

Once the hot glue is dry, cut the pom pom trim from the spool and trim the ends of it down to the edges of the frame. 

That’s it! You’re all done making this Dollar Tree Red Truck Gift Bad DIY Christmas Sign! 

I hope you enjoyed this Dollar Tree Red Truck Gift Bag DIY Christmas Sign as much as I did and decide to make one for yourself!

I would love to see how yours turns out! You should totally join my FREE Facebook group called On A Budget Crafts! It is a judgment-free community for DIY crafters to show off their projects and ideas. 

If you loved this DIY you might also like this Dollar Tree Gift Box DIY Christmas Decor! 

Thanks for stopping by! XOXO Amber

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