Halloween Reverse Sign using a Cricut!

Want to make some Halloween Cricut projects? Find out how to make a reverse canvas Halloween sign and grab a Halloween free cut file!

Hi Friends! Are you ready for Halloween?? It’s coming fast, right??

I am not a huge Halloween decorator, I like to save my craziness for Christmas. But I have made a few Halloween Cricut projects that I wanted to share with you, plus give you a free SVG cut file.

Y’all know I love my Cricut and make most of my home decor using it. If you are wanting more information on this amazing machine, click here for my Ultimate Guide of Cricut ideas!

For this project, I made a reverse canvas sign. As you might remember, I made Our Love Story reverse canvas sign with a sharpie instead of iron-on vinyl (click here for a full video tutorial on making a reverse canvas sign without heat transfer vinyl.

Table of Contents

Materials Needed for Halloween Cricut Projects

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links from Amazon and/or Cricut.com. I receive a small commission at no cost to you when you make a purchase using my links.

canvas – I used a 12×12 square canvas found here
Heat Transfer Vinyl or Iron-On – I used black glitter HTV because that’s what I had on hand and because I love glitter! Can find at Cricut.com here or on Amazon here.
Cricut Explore or Cricut Maker – You can find on Amazon here or at Cricut.com here (always check both places for best prices!)
acrylic paints and brushes – I used black on the frame and different orange shades for the moon
Contact paper or adhesive vinyl for the moon
Mod Podge
staple gun
orbital sander or sandpaper
Heat Press, EasyPress or Iron
Ok, let’s get started! I have a video tutorial further down the page if you are more of a visual learner. It also shows you how I painted the moon since that’s a little hard to explain!

Prepping the Reverse Canvas Sign

The first thing you’ll want to do is to remove the canvas from the wood frame. Take out all the staples on the back or use a utility knife and cut the canvas right next to the staples.

I usually remove them with a utility knife and pliers, just be careful! Or you can take the easy way and just cut the canvas off and leave the staples in (I admit, I do this sometimes!)

Then place the wood frame on top of the canvas and trace its outline. Just cut a little inside the line and you’ll have a perfect size that you will be using.

Prep the frame by sanding it and painting it the color of your choice. On some of my reverse canvas signs, I fill in the holes with wood filler but I skipped that step and just painted the whole thing black. Let it dry.

Cut out the SVG file with your Cricut on heat transfer vinyl.

FREE Halloween SVG Cut File

As with all of my free Cricut files, these are for personal use only!

Download the FREE SVG file by clicking here to use in Cricut Design Space

Download PNG by clicking here and for the moon click here

If you need help on how to download and then upload the file into CDS, click here for my video tutorial.

Designing Reverse Canvas in Cricut Design Space

I insert a 10×10 square behind the image so I can see how big I want it.

Once it’s the size you want, hit the “make it” button. Make sure to click the “mirror” option on the preview page on the left-hand side under the material size.

On the drop-down menu for material, I browse “iron on” and then click on “glitter iron-on”.

Load your iron-on shiny side DOWN onto your Cricut mat. Since glitter iron-on is pretty thick, I use a few pieces of blue tape to hold it down at the top and bottom (you’ll see the tape on the video!).

Since the moon I’m cutting out as a stencil, I cut it out of contact paper.

Weed out the extra vinyl of the big image and negative weed out the moon (just remove the circle!).

Apply the moon stencil to the canvas, seal the edges with some mod podge, and paint it.

You can see in the YouTube video how I painted mine. I first painted a yellowish layer over the circle with a paintbrush. I let it dry a little and then used sponge daubers to add two different oranges to it.

I added a little bit of gold sparkle paint at the end. I didn’t let it dry long enough before I heat pressed it, because it stuck to my Teflon sheet. So, if you are going to add some glitter, let it fully dry!

I have a heat press and love it! If you don’t have one, you can use an iron or Cricut EasyPress. If you’d like to check out a video of how I use my heat press click here.

Applying HTV to Canvas

I set my heat press to 305 and pressed for 20 seconds. Removed the plastic, placed a Teflon sheet over it, and pressed for 20 more seconds.

Once your frame is dry, use a staple gun to attach the canvas to the back and you’re done!

Cute and easy, right?

You can also tape some fairy lights (on Amazon here) to the back so that it lights up at night! I just taped the lights so that they would only show through the moon and windows.

The possibilities are endless when it comes to Halloween Cricut projects! Make sure to browse my roundup of even more Cricut Halloween ideas to get more inspiration!

If you like glitter like I do and want to learn how to make a glitter jack-o-lantern click here or Halloween glitter wine glasses with Cricut decals click here!