All right, today we're going to continue the tour de living room once again. And I hate to do this to you, but I'm going to jump around. If our living room is a square, which it is, you saw the north wall Monday and the west wall Tuesday. And today, we're skipping over to the east wall, which was previously the accent wall, painted a metallic blue. This is where the bookshelves were originally.
We originally planned to keep this wall, until I found my perfect curtains, and decided that it would be neat if we extended our accent wall color into the kitchen. So we painted the former accent wall the same color as the rest of the room and moved the accent wall to the north wall. Got it?
This is not super exciting right now, and let me tell you, the table is never that clean. But let me tell you about that table. Nathan's dad built it for us when we moved in, and we designed it to work with the small space. It's long and skinny to fit on the wall, and it also has two big leaves for when we have company. Nathan also wanted his dad to build it a bit taller than normal tables so it was better for him. Alas, we did not consider the fact that making it taller would make it too tall for me, so a lot of the time I have to sit on my knees on the chair, even though my mom tells me how bad it is to do so. The other issue we ran into was that the custom size does not make tablecloth shopping easy. However, we learned that fabric shower curtains are the perfect size.
Even though the wall is bare now, I have been doing some projects this week (slash this morning) that still need to be hung up. I shall call them "travel art." Here are the three pieces all together, followed by a tutorial on how to make them. It's pretty easy, but there is math involved.
Even though the wall is bare now, I have been doing some projects this week (slash this morning) that still need to be hung up. I shall call them "travel art." Here are the three pieces all together, followed by a tutorial on how to make them. It's pretty easy, but there is math involved.
Let's start with the collage frames, because they are the easiest and really only take about 10 minutes each. You will need scissors, tape, a pencil, exacto knife (if you have one), pictures, a frame of some kind, and an atlas. I went thrifting with Nathan's mom to find an atlas and we had no luck, and then she realized they had an old one at home. So she brought me the atlas from 1977 and it was perfect.
Ideally, you want the maps to be the same approximate size as your frame or the matte you're going to use--you can see what I mean here.
Ideally, you want the maps to be the same approximate size as your frame or the matte you're going to use--you can see what I mean here.
First, you choose the map you want to use. I wanted to use the one of the entire country, but I only had one and two frames. So I decided on Nebraska and then spent a lot of time thinking about what other state had meaning for us. It took me longer than I'd like to admit to decide on Colorado, considering I lived there for the first 18 years/majority of my life, but it eventually came to me.
Next, you cut out your map pages with the exacto knife. Try to get the line as clean as possible, and I learned that if you turn the page and cut from the back on the second one, it's easier. You want to be able to match them up nicely.
Your third step should be taking the photos to the matte. I learned this the hard way; the first one I did, I had all of the maps taped down and then had to maneuver the pictures in just right. So learn from my mistakes. The photos I used are ones of us in the places we've been: California, Monte Carlo, Rome, Pisa, Dallas, Bahamas, and two South Dakota places, Mount Rushmore and Laura Ingalls Wilder's house. That's where the map idea came from--I wanted to show off the travel photos, but we haven't been 16 places yet and so I wanted something to fill in the empty space.
Once your photos are in place, put the map behind them, making sure the two pages line up. You'll probably have to cut away part of the map to make it work, but I found what needed to be cut was the close up of the bigger cities that are off to the side. Now, just tape the map down (regular tape is way better than double-stick tape, and put the frame back together. Repeat if necessary. You're done!
Next, you cut out your map pages with the exacto knife. Try to get the line as clean as possible, and I learned that if you turn the page and cut from the back on the second one, it's easier. You want to be able to match them up nicely.
Your third step should be taking the photos to the matte. I learned this the hard way; the first one I did, I had all of the maps taped down and then had to maneuver the pictures in just right. So learn from my mistakes. The photos I used are ones of us in the places we've been: California, Monte Carlo, Rome, Pisa, Dallas, Bahamas, and two South Dakota places, Mount Rushmore and Laura Ingalls Wilder's house. That's where the map idea came from--I wanted to show off the travel photos, but we haven't been 16 places yet and so I wanted something to fill in the empty space.
Once your photos are in place, put the map behind them, making sure the two pages line up. You'll probably have to cut away part of the map to make it work, but I found what needed to be cut was the close up of the bigger cities that are off to the side. Now, just tape the map down (regular tape is way better than double-stick tape, and put the frame back together. Repeat if necessary. You're done!
Now, onto the small frame. I originally had an L thing made to go in the middle, but then I came across a cool print on etsy (via younghouselove) that said "Let's Go Anywhere." I had planned on buying that, until I found these really cool travel-themed letter stickers at target yesterday that would let me do something similar and make it myself.
I googled travel quotes and thought of some on my own. The front runners were let's go everywhere (similar to the one above), love is an adventure, not all who wander are lost, let's go together, etc., etc. And then, when googling adventure, one of the more "popular" searches was "Up" adventure quotes, which turned out to be "Adventure is out there." The movie "Up" is one that we have not seen a gazillion times, but we went and saw it in the theater after looking at engagement rings, and out of all the Disney movies, I think it paints such a realistic view of marriage. We used the main theme song, married life, at our wedding, and Nathan liked the quote best, so I chose that to use.
I thought this would take me no time at all. Put some stickers on a piece of paper and be done with it. Wrong.
First, I cut a 12x12 piece of paper down to 8x10 using the fake photo that came with the frame as a template. This was a bad idea, because it actually was too big, as I found out later. So used the inside of the matte to trace a rectangle on your paper before you do anything else.
Then, I did some math. I spelled out my words and the measured the width of the corresponding stickers, accounting for spaces on the second line. Then I accounted for spaces between the letters, added it all up, and subtracted that number from the total width. Then I divided that number by two to get everything centered right. For example, my top line was 1.5 picas of space on either side--yes, I did everything in picas because it's easier for me to do the math.
I did similar math when trying to figure out how to center the words on the page. But instead of figuring out space on either side, I was trying to get the words centered. I measured the height of the letters, which was standard: 8 picas. Then I found the center of the page and made a mark. I accounted for two picas of space between the lines, so I added one pica above, then 8 for the letter height, and drew a line 9 picas above the middle, followed by a line 9 picas below the middle. I drew a line straight across--the top line was for the top of my first-line letters, the bottom line for the bottom-line letters. Got it? Here's a not-very-good shot of what it looked like, but it might help you visualize.
I googled travel quotes and thought of some on my own. The front runners were let's go everywhere (similar to the one above), love is an adventure, not all who wander are lost, let's go together, etc., etc. And then, when googling adventure, one of the more "popular" searches was "Up" adventure quotes, which turned out to be "Adventure is out there." The movie "Up" is one that we have not seen a gazillion times, but we went and saw it in the theater after looking at engagement rings, and out of all the Disney movies, I think it paints such a realistic view of marriage. We used the main theme song, married life, at our wedding, and Nathan liked the quote best, so I chose that to use.
I thought this would take me no time at all. Put some stickers on a piece of paper and be done with it. Wrong.
First, I cut a 12x12 piece of paper down to 8x10 using the fake photo that came with the frame as a template. This was a bad idea, because it actually was too big, as I found out later. So used the inside of the matte to trace a rectangle on your paper before you do anything else.
Then, I did some math. I spelled out my words and the measured the width of the corresponding stickers, accounting for spaces on the second line. Then I accounted for spaces between the letters, added it all up, and subtracted that number from the total width. Then I divided that number by two to get everything centered right. For example, my top line was 1.5 picas of space on either side--yes, I did everything in picas because it's easier for me to do the math.
I did similar math when trying to figure out how to center the words on the page. But instead of figuring out space on either side, I was trying to get the words centered. I measured the height of the letters, which was standard: 8 picas. Then I found the center of the page and made a mark. I accounted for two picas of space between the lines, so I added one pica above, then 8 for the letter height, and drew a line 9 picas above the middle, followed by a line 9 picas below the middle. I drew a line straight across--the top line was for the top of my first-line letters, the bottom line for the bottom-line letters. Got it? Here's a not-very-good shot of what it looked like, but it might help you visualize.
My method worked perfectly for the top line, because it was only one word. But I didn't account for enough space between the words on the bottom line, which I found out after the first word was placed. So I had to improvise, but everything still fit (thank goodness!). It just doesn't look as clean as the top line, but when it's hanging on the wall, you probably won't notice. At least that's what I tell myself.
Use a pink pearl eraser (my most essential craft supply) to erase all of your crazy marks and put the frame back together. Now it's ready to hang up.
Use a pink pearl eraser (my most essential craft supply) to erase all of your crazy marks and put the frame back together. Now it's ready to hang up.
And you've made it through the longest. blog post. ever. See you tomorrow for our final wall reveal--I promise, next week I'll get back to writing about something other than just one room in my house!
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