A Third Graduation Photo Frame and Tassel Holder

Materials:
*Photo frame
*Commencement program
*Photos
*Ticket
*Brad
*Scissors
*X-acto knife
*Black cardstock
*Mounting tape

Directions:
*Cut out a page of the program, such as the one with your graduate's name.
*Using the X-acto knife, create a small incision in the top of the program on the right side.
*Slide a brad through the incision.  This will be where you'll hang the tassel.
*Crop the photos to size and arrange on the program, along with the commencement ticket.  add some black cardstock to frame the photos if you so choose.
*To highlight your graduate's name, cut out a rectangle from the cardstock about 1/2" longer and 1/2" wider than what would be required to cover the name.
*Cut out a rectangle from the black rectangle using the X-acto knife that is the same length and width as the name.  Use the resulting rectangular frame to highlight the name.

Glittery, Color Dipped Photos

     Looking for a fun way to display your favorite pics?  Try making these color dipped photos and hang them from a photo "clothesline."  I got the idea from this blog.

Materials:
*Paint in various colors
*Glitter paint
*Paintbrush
*Photos
*Painter's tape

Directions:
*To give photos the old-style Polaroid look, crop photos to squares and leave extra white space around them during the printing.
*Using painter's tape, cover the part of the white space immediately below the image.
*Paint the bottom of the photo below the painter's tape using one of the colors of paint.  Set aside to dry.
*Once dry, add a second coat of paint if necessary.  Finish off with a coat of glitter paint.
*Carefully peel off the painter's tape.  Maybe this happened just because my tape was old and had been living above the heat register, but for some reason the tape did not peel off easily and left behind a sticky residue.  If this happens, carefully wash off as much of the sticky residue as you can with soap and water and then cover the photos using self-adhesive laminate.

Photo "Clothesline"

     Looking for a way to display photos, cards, or other items, or to keep track of memos and to do lists?  Try making this photo "clothesline."

Materials:

*Ribbon

*Thumbtacks

*Mini clothespins

Directions:

*Hang the ribbon up on the wall using thumbtacks.  If you're working with a narrow wall, instead of hanging the ribbon straight across, try letting part of it hang down.

*Use the clothespins to hang up photos and other items.

Curious about the color dipped photos hanging from my "clothesline"?  Next week I'll explain how to make them.

Zombie Valentine's Lotto Ticket

    Here's a slightly different take on the Valentine's lotto tickets I've seen floating around online.  Instead of having prizes underneath each scratch off heart so that your loved one is guaranteed to be a winner, add zombie images under some of them.  You can still think up a prize to correspond to the zombies if you would like, but don't tell your valentine about that beforehand.  Keep them in suspense as they play the zombie Valentine's lottery.

Materials:
*Zombie lotto ticket printout (either my template or your own design)
*Pink cardstock
*All purpose adhesive
*Acrylic paint
*Liquid soap
*Pencil
*Paintbrush
*Scissors

Directions:
*Print out zombie lotto ticket, either my design (pictured below) or make your own design.

*Glue template onto pink cardstock.
*Write/draw/paste in your zombies and prizes.  I used photos of my sister Katie, Brian, and me dressed up as zombies (as well as a photo of zombie gingerbread) for the zombie hearts.  You can use whatever ratio of zombies to hearts you would like.  Since I'm rather cruel, I stacked the odds against Brian, adding five zombies and four prizes:

*Take a strip of contact paper and trace nine hearts onto the back.
*Mix one part liquid soap with two parts acrylic paint.
*Paint the soap/paint mixture across the contact paper.  Set aside to dry,  Add a second coat if necessary.  (Full disclosure: I didn't have any contact paper, so I used packing tape instead.  I stuck each end of the tape to the bottom of a drinking glass and then painted it.  Once the paint was dry, I traced hearts onto the paint using a black permanent marker, ending up with the situation pictured below.  It worked, but it was a lot more challenging than I imagine using contact paper would be.)

*Once dry, cut out the hearts and stick them over the text/image hearts.  Now you're ready to pass it off to a loved one to play.

Unfortunately for Brian, he ended up with a zombie.  Somehow he survived the encounter and I told him he could scratch off until he won a prize.  After a second close encounter with the zombie kind, he finally won a kiss.

Christmas Memory Box

      Hope you all have been enjoying your holidays.  Here's a neat way to preserve your holiday memories.  I bought an unfinished cigar box from Joann and painted and then stuck in some little mementos of Christmas, such as gift tags, paper snowflakes, and some bubbles I got from my family's annual "yucky" swap.  It's hard to tell from the photo, but I have a couple of pieces of cardboard behind each of the three framed pictures inside the box to make them "pop out."  Also, the little "present" opens up into an accordion style photo album.  Check out the video below for more details and check below for a few more pics :).

     This is what the outside of the box looks like,

     Here's what it looks like with the photo album pulled out and the little book moved aside.  You can see that I have a little photo of my tree that hides behind where the book goes.

Family is Love Fall Leaves Journal

     To me, Thanksgiving is all about family.  When I was brainstorming ideas for Thanksgiving crafts, I wanted to find some way to incorporate this notion.  I had seen someone make glitter edged book print leaves and had some issues of the Bangor Daily News kicking around.  I had helped my sister and the student group she's a member of, Maine Business School Corps, put on a march against domestic violence and I had needed a couple copies of the paper to scrapbook the story they did on the event.  The red edged leaf actually has text from the story, which I thought would go along well with the family theme.  Anyway, this is what I came up with.

Materials:
*Glitter in 3 different fall colors
*Spiral bound notebook
*Glue
*Newspaper
*Small black and white family photos
*Silver gel pen
*3 different leaf templates
*Pencil or ballpoint pen
*Scissors

Directions:
*Cover your workstation in newspaper.
*Trace the leaf templates onto the newspaper and cut out.
*Add glue around the edge of one of the newspaper leaves and then cover it with glitter.  Set aside to dry.
*Repeat with the other two leaves.  Once the leaves are dry, shake off excess glitter and pour it back into the container.
*Print out small, completely desaturated photos of your family, however you choose to define family.
*Arrange the photos and the leaves on the notebook cover and glue down.
*Brainstorm a list of what family means to you.  Using the silver gel pen, write out that list, starting with "Family is . . ." followed by the various items.  Mine says, "Family is . . . hugs . . . hope . . . togetherness . . . memories . . . past . . . future . . . joy . . . sharing . . . acceptance . . . transcendence . . . respect . . . chaos . . . friendship . . . trust . . . compassion . . . guidance . . . silliness . . . support . . . messy . .  . wisdom . . . strength . . . a helping hand . . . good times . . . hardships . . . remembrance . . . a choice . . . celebration . . . holidays . . . traditions . . . always changing . . . home . . . stories."
*Toward the center of the journal, write "Family is love."

Another Graduation Photo Frame and Tassel Holder

     On Saturday I graduated with a Master's of Arts in mathematics, which meant it was time for me to make another graduation photo frame and tassel holder (you can see my photo frame and tassel holder for my undergraduate graduation here).

Materials:
*Photos
*12" x 12" sheet of plywood
*12" x 12" piece of patterned scrapbooking paper
*Scissors
*Decorative edge scissors
*12" x 12" sheet white cardstock or two 8 1/2" x 11" sheets of white cardstock
*Scraps of brown, black, orange, and white paper (to make the owl)
*Scraps of paper in three corresponding colors (for the owl's feathers)
*Small heart shaped punch (optional)
*All purpose adhesive
*Mounting tape
*Rhinestone
*Hammer
*Small nail
*X-acto knife
*Ruler
*Pencil
*Black thread

Directions:
*Glue sheet of patterned cardstock to the plywood.
*Using an enlarged version of the graduation hat in the graduation owl template (given below), cut out a graduation cap from black paper.  Glue it to the patterned cardstock as in the above picture.

*Hammer a small nail through the center of the graduation cap, leaving a small gap between the head of the nail and the plywood so that the tassel can be hung up on it.  If the nail pokes through the back of the plywood, you can either trim the nail down using wire cutters or cover the pointy end of the nail with a dab of glue so that it won't poke into anything.
*Glue a small rhinestone over the head of the nail.
*Using a ruler, mark out the desired dimensions for the frames for each of the photos.
*Use decorative edge scissors to give the frames a fun shape.
*Carefully cut out the inside of each frame using an X-acto knife.
*Using mounting tape, adhere the pictures to their respective places on the patterned cardstock.
*Glue frames over the pictures.
*To make the graduation owl, print out a small graduation owl template.
*Cut out the body and two copies of the wings from brown paper, two large circles from white paper for the eyes, two small black circles for pupils, and a small orange triangle for the beak.  Cut out or punch out using a heart shaped punch nine hearts, one in each of the three corresponding colors, to make the feathers.
*Glue together the various parts of the owl like this:

*Cut out a short but long rectangle of white paper.  Roll it up and tie it closed with black thread to form the owl's diploma.
*Glue the diploma to the owl's wing and then glue the owl to the patterned cardstock.

Mini Polaroid Refrigerator Magnets

Materials:
*Digital photos and printer
*Magnetic backing
*Scissors

Directions:
*Crop desired pictures to square shapes and shrink them to the desired size.
*Paste squares into a word document, leaving plenty of white space between pictures.
*Print out pictures and crop them to look like Polaroids.
*Adhere magnetic backing to the backs of the pictures.
*Place on your refrigerator or another metallic surface.

Photo Silhouette Bookmarks

     I found this craft idea on this blog.  Here are my own versions of the bookmarks, along with some instructions.

Materials:
*Photos
*Scissors
*Hole puncher
*Self-adhesive laminating sheets
*Ribbon

Directions:
*Punch a hole above the subject(s) of your photo where you would like the ribbon to go.
*Cut around the subject(s), leaving about an eighth of an inch of border around everything.
*Sandwich photos between two self-adhesive laminating sheets and then cut out the photos, again leaving a border.
*Punch over the plastic covering the hole for the ribbon.  Depending on how sharp your punch is, it may or may not punch through the plastic well, but you can use an X-acto knife to cut out excess plastic if the hole punch doesn't work.
*Cut off a length of ribbon and loop it through the hole in the bookmark.

Photo Cube Puzzle

Materials:
* 8 wooden blocks 1 1/4" x 1 1/4"
*12 photos 2 1/2" x 2 1/2"
*Photo safe adhesive
*Scissors
*Ruler
*Pen

Directions:
*Arrange the eight wooden blocks into a cube with dimensions 2 blocks x 2 blocks x 2 blocks.
*Select a photo and carefully divide it into four 1 1/4" x 1 1/4" squares.
*Cut out the squares and glue them to one face of the cube so that the pieces line up to form the original image.
*Repeat the process for another photo and glue the pieces to a neighboring face of the cube.  Make sure the first and second pictures are facing the same direction.
*Repeat the process for another photo and glue the pieces to the top of the cube.  Let dry.
*Once the three faces have dried, carefully flip the cube upside down.  Repeat the above procedure for the remaining sides of the cube.  Let dry.
*Turn the cubes so that the photo covered sides face toward the center of the cube.  One quick way to do this is take the top and bottom halves of the cube and swap their positions, then take the left and right halves of the cube and swap them, and finally take the front and back halves and swap them.  You should be left with a blank cube.
*Cut up and glue pictures to the blocks following the above procedure.
*Now you can swap between the two photo cube arrangements.  It's like having two photo cubes (although you can only use one at a time).

Oversized Clothespin Photo Display

Materials:
*Oversized clothespin
*Stickers, die cuts, or other embellishments
*Patterned paper
*Thin cardboard (e.g. cereal box)
*Photo
*Mounting tape (or other photo mounting adhesive)
*All purpose adhesive

Directions:
*Choose a photo that you would like to display, then select paper, stickers, etc., that you feel represent the important aspects of your photo or the event it represents.  For example, my picture was taken on a trip to Rockland, wherein I did some genealogical research and visited a lighthouse museum.  I chose a lighthouse die cut for the museum, vital record paper for the genealogy, a map sticker because our GPS stopped working as we were heading home and I insisted that we buy a map, and a lobster sticker because of our lobster magnet souvenirs and because we took out picture in front of a giant lobster.
*Decorate the clothespin as you see fit.
*Cut the paper so that it is slightly larger than your photo.  Cut out a piece of cardboard the same size and adhere the paper to the cardboard.
*Mount your photo on the paper.  Add stickers or other embellishments, then clip inside the clothespin.

Photo Advent Calendar

Materials:
*Photo frame approximately 8" x 16"
*10" x 20" piece of fabric
*Ribbon in two different colors
*6 sheets of Christmas themed patterned paper
*Glitter glue in two colors
*24 mimi clothespins
*All purpose adhesive
*Mounting tape or mounting squares
*Printed numbers or number stickers
*Scissors
*Computer with printer/scanner
*Photo paper

Directions:
*Lay fabric face down on a flat surface and place the glass from the photo frame on top of the fabric(if you would prefer not to use the glass for the base of your calendar, you can use cardboard or foam board instead).
*Run all purpose adhesive along the edges of the backside of the glass and adhere the fabric to this.  Make sure to pull the fabric as tight as you can while gluing so that you won’t end up with bunches of fabric on the front side.  Let the adhesive dry.
*While the adhesive is drying, cut four 1.25" x 1.75" rectangles from each sheet of patterned paper.  You should end up with 24 rectangles in total.
*Affix numbers to the rectangles such that each rectangle has a unique number from 1 to 24.
*Find 24 old Christmas photos and, if not already digitized, scan them into the computer.  Crop the photos into squares, then shrink each square to 1.25" x 1.25". 
*Import the photos into a word processing program and arrange the photos such that there is half an inch of white space above each photo.  Print out the photos and cut out 1.25" x 1.75" rectangles consisting of the photo squares and the half inch of white space.
*Decorate the white space on the photo rectangles with glitter glue, then set aside to dry.
*Cut four lengths of ribbon about 9.5" in length.  Clasp 6 clothespins on each length of ribbon.  Place one ribbon on the fabric covered glass about 1" below the top.  Glue one end to the back of the glass, then pull the ribbon tightly across and glue the other end.
*Glue successive ribbons in the same fashion about 3.75" to 4" below the previous ribbon.  Set aside to dry.
*Once the adhesive on the ribbons has dried, place the fabric covered ribbon back inside the frame.
*Once the glitter glue has dried on the photo rectangles, adhere using mounting tape numbered pattern paper rectangles and photo rectangles together so that one side of the resulting rectangle depicts the patterned paper and the other side shows the photo.
*Attach rectangles to the ribbons using the mini clothespins with the number side facing out.  Turn each rectangle over to display the photo when the designated day in December arrives.

Personalized Magnetic Paper Dolls

When I was a kid, I had a set of Edwardian era paper dolls that I enjoyed playing with and sometimes my mom would draw paper dolls for me.  I used to wish that I could have a paper doll version of myself, though.  Here is a way to provide your child or another individual in your life with a personalized paper doll.  Also, by magnetizing the pieces it may make it easier for your child to play with (I always found the paper tabs annoying) and easier to keep track of all of the pieces.

Materials required for both options 1 and 2:
*Printable magnet sheets (preferably without a gloss finish, especially if the intended recipient is young, since glossy images will scratch more easily)
*Camera
*Computer and printer
*Scissors
*Sheet of printer paper

Materials required for option 2 only:
*Pencil or pen
*Markers, glitter, and other imbellishments

Directions:
*Photograph the individual you intend to make a paper doll of.  If you are planning on including shorts and T-shirts in the paper doll wardrobe, it works best if you photograph your subject wearing a swimsuit or shorts and a tank top.

Option 1: Photographed clothes
*Next photograph your subject wearing a variety of different outfits that you would like to include in the paper doll wardrobe. 
Note: This option works well for shorts, T-shirts, and billowy clothing since the subject will not need to replicate their original position exactly for these garments to fit the paper doll, but can be quite tricky with long pants or long sleeved shorts.  To make the jeans fit my paper doll, I widened the legs of the jeans using Paint.  As another option, you could leave white space around the garments, as I did with the shoes, so that it won't matter if the garment would not fit the paper doll body exactly.
*As a test, print the paper doll and the clothing garments onto a sheet of paper.  Cut out the garments and make sure that they fit the doll.  If they do not fit, try some of the remedy techniques mentioned above or try photographing your subject again.
*Once you are certain that the clothes will work for the doll, print out the doll and clothing onto the printable magnet sheets.
*Cut out the doll and garments and your doll will be ready to use.

Option 2: Draw your own clothes
Note: This option is easier than option 1 and can give your intended recipient an avenue for creative expression.
*Print out the photo of the subject onto a printable magnet sheet.
*Print another photo of the subject onto a sheet of printer paper.
*Cut out the photo on the printer paper.
*Place the photo onto a printable magnet sheet and trace around the outline of the subject to create garments that will be the right size for the doll.
*Decorate the clothes as you wish.  If you are giving this doll to a child, s/he might get a kick out of designing her/his ideal wardrobe for her/his paper doll.

Photo Magnets

Materials:
*Small pictures
*Large clear flat backed glass marbles
*Scissors
*Pen
*Mod Podge
*Paintbrush
*Magnetic backing
*Strong adhesive

Directions:
*Place flat backed glass marble on top of your picture and move it around until you can see the portion of the picture that you want to see through the marble
*Trace around the marble
*Cut out the picture
*Using your paintbrush, spread a very thin layer of Mod Podge across the back of the marble
*Place the picture on the back of the marble.  Set aside to dry
*Once dry, glue a piece of magnetic backing to the back of the marble.  Even if you have self-adhering magnetic backing, it may not be strong enough to support the weight of the marble

If you have a magnetic photo frame . . .
*Pick up some smaller clear flat backed glass marbles.  Using the above procedure, create magnetic captions, images, and other decorations

Family Tree Photo Wall Hanging

Materials:

*15 photo charms

*Small images of yourself, your parents, your grandparents, and your great-grandparents

*Solid colored fabric for the tree

*Fabric for the background

*Ribbon

*All purpose adhesive

*Tree pattern

*Chalk

*Scissors

*Tape

*Wooden dowel (I used a section of an old plastic coat hanger in place of the dowel)

Directions:

*Crop pictures to the appropriate size and place them inside the photo charms

*Design or locate a pattern for the tree.  Here is my pattern, and there are many more available online

*Resize the tree pattern if it is not the desired size.  I resized mine to 250% the original size

*Print and assemble the tree pattern.  My pattern took up multiple sheets of paper, so I had to cut it out and tape the pieces together, but, depending on how large you want your tree to be, you may not need to do this

*Lay out the tree pattern on the solid colored fabric.  Trace the outline with chalk, then cut out the tree shape

*Arrange the tree shape on the background fabric, then glue the tree to the background fabric.  Let dry

*Arrange the photo frames on the tree, then glue the photo frames down.  Let dry

*Glue the top of the wall hanging to the wooden dowel.  Let dry

*Glue on some ribbon to use to hang up the wall hanging.  Let dry

What to do if you don’t have a picture of one of your ancestors:

*Do you have some idea of what your ancestor looked like?  You could try constructing a picture (which is what I did).  Alternately, if you have pictures of their parents, siblings, and/or children, you could use photo morphing software to create an image of what this individual may have looked like

*If you have no idea what this individual looked like, you could write their name on a piece of paper and put it in the charm or use an image of a favorite hobby or pastime or something that you feel represents the individual

*If you know nothing about this individual whatsoever, you can always leave off this branch of the family tree or use very generic imagery about the family as a whole or the family name or something like that

Patterned Paper and Bookmarks

Patterned Paper

     There are a number of different ways of making patterned paper, but this one is relatively easy and inexpensive, as long as you have access to a computer and a black ink printer.

Materials:

*Solid colored 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of scrapbooking paper

*Paint or similar drawing program

*Computer

*Printer

Directions:

*Draw black and white images using your drawing program.  I drew stick figure zombies for a Halloween page

*Print them onto the solid colored scrapbooking paper

Bookmarks

Materials:

*Patterned paper

*Small images

*Scissors

*Adhesive (such as mounting squares)

*Ruler

*Pencil

*Laminator (optional)

Directions:

*Determine the size you want to make your bookmark

*On the back of the sheet of patterned paper, trace out a section of patterned paper that is the right size for your bookmark, then cut it out

*Arrange the images on the section of paper, then adhere the images to the paper

*If you have access to a laminator, you can laminate your bookmark

Suggestion:

*To further personalize your bookmark, use patterned paper you've designed yourself

Family History Collage

  I am an avid genealogist and family historian, and for quite a while I have wanted to find some way to incorporate my family history research into my crafting.  I decided to create a collage for my 5^th great grandmother, Rebecca Smith Blodget, the woman who inspired me to begin my family history research.  The purpose of this collage was to tell something of her story, though unfortunately I do not know enough about her to adequately represent her. 

Materials:

*8½ x 11 photo frame

*8½ x 11 sheet of patterned paper

*Mounting squares or other adhesive

*Foam board

*Scissors or X-acto knife

Suggested additional materials:

*Pictures of the individual and important people in her or his life

 *Signature or other handwriting sample

*Descriptive saying or quote

*Stickers or drawings representing favorite activities or pastimes

*Other mementos that remind you of the individual

Suggestions:

*Select an individual in your family to make the collage about.  Parents, grandparents, and siblings could be good choices, or perhaps a distant relative or a family friend.

*If possible, find a picture of this individual to use in your collage.  You may also want to include images of important people in this individual’s life.  In my collage, the pictures in the top right and bottom left corners are of Rebecca Blodget.  In the top left corner, the man on the left is her husband, Samuel Blodget, and the man on the right is her friend and the love of her life, Aaron Burr.  In the bottom right corner I included pictures of her parents, William and Rebecca (Moore) Smith

*You may wish to include a copy of your chosen individual’s signature or other handwriting sample.  I culled Rebecca Blodget’s signature from a photo I took of a letter she wrote.  If your chosen individual is more recent, but you don’t have an easy way to obtain a writing sample from them personally, birthday and holiday cards may be places where you could find handwriting samples

*Does the individual you chose have any famous sayings?  Maybe a favorite joke?  The quote I selected was from the introduction of a letter Rebecca wrote to James Madison that I felt was representative of her character

*What does/did this individual enjoy doing?  Find ways to represent this pictorially.  For my project, I didn’t really know what Rebecca Blodget enjoyed doing, so I used images of things that I knew she did.  I had learned from a letter she wrote to Henry Clay that when she was young, her father had encouraged her to read from his library, and from the historical references she makes in her letters, it’s pretty clear that she was a well read individual.  I also knew that she wrote a decent number of letters, so I included a picture of the letter she wrote to James Madison

*Where does/did the individual live?  I printed a portion of a map of Colonial Philadelphia onto my background paper.  The spot denoted with the number 36 is a house that her father had owned.  Other ways to incorporate residency could include a picture of the family home, images of prominent features in or around the home, or an image of the town

*Do you have any small mementos that remind you of the individual?  You may want to include these items or likenesses of said items 

*The above mentioned suggestions are just a few possibilities.  There is so much more you could do with a project like this

Directions:

*Remove glass or plastic front from the photo frame.  It will not be needed for this project

*Affix patterned paper to the photo frame backing, then put back into the frame

*Using scissors or and X-acto knife, cut out sections of foam board.  Attach items you want to stand out to the sections of foam board.  I chose to do this for all images of people, but you could find some other way to do it

*Arrange items on the patterned paper in a visually appealing manner, then adhere to the paper

Quote Book

     Here is a craft that can be as simple or complex as you would like to make it.  It can make a great keepsake, or is can serve as a wonderful gift for a friend.

Materials:

*Miniature scrapbook album

*Photos or images

*Quotations

*Adhesive (e.g. mounting squares, acid-free glue)

*Embellishments (e.g. stickers, paper scraps, glitter, markers, etc)

Directions:

*Select quotes for your quotation book.  For months I have been jotting down silly things said by friends and family members, so I decided to use these quotes in my quote book.  However, you can also find tons of quotes online

*Find or make pictures to go along with your quotes.  I chose to use silly images of the people I was quoting, but there are so many other choices you can make

*Format your quote book.  Find some way to arrange images and quotations in a manner you find pleasing, then adhere the images and quotes to the pages of the album

*Add embellishments to decorate your album

Magnetic calendar

     Instead of buying a paper calendar that lasts for only one year, why not make a calendar that you can reuse each year?

Materials:

*Printable magnetic sheets (3-4 sheets should be fine)

*Printer

*Scissors

Directions:

*On your computer, design at least 31 2”x2” squares (you may want to design additional squares for holidays, birthdays, etc.) that will form the basis of your calendar.  Overlay numbers on top of the images for the squares, labeling the squares from 1-31. 

*Design 7 days of the week headings that are slightly wider than your calendar squares.

*Design 12 month headings

*Print all of these images onto the printable magnetic sheets (it may be easiest to import all of the images into a word document and print from there)

*Arrange squares on your refrigerator or other magnetic surface.

Photo Decor

     Looking for a way to display photos other than traditional picture frames?  Here are a couple of creative ways to showcase your pictures.

3-D Photo Display

Materials:

*Foam board

*Sheet of printed paper at least 9”x9”

*9 photos 2”x2” or 2.5”x2.5”

*Photo safe adhesive (such as photo mounting squares)

*All purpose adhesive

*Ribbon

*Scissors and/or X-acto knife (X-acto knife may work a bit better than scissors for cutting foam board)

Directions:

*Cut a 9”x9” square of foam board.

*Cut sheet of paper to 9”x9” if it is not already that size, then adhere to one side of the foam board using your photo safe adhesive.

*Crop photos to desired size. 

*Cut out nine sections of foam board that are slightly smaller than your photos (e.g. if your pictures are 2”x2”, you may want to cut out sections of foam board that are 1¾”x1¾”).

*Adhere pictures to foam squares using your photo safe adhesive.

*Arrange squares on the patterned paper in a way that you find desirable, then adhere squares to the paper using your photo safe adhesive.

*Glue a loop of ribbon to the back of the project using your all purpose adhesive.  Once the glue is dry, you will be able to hang up your photo creation.

Picture Hanger

Materials:

*Decorative hanger

*Assorted beads

*Headpins

*Foam board

*Photos

*Different sheets of patterned paper (if you have leftover scraps of paper from other projects, this would be a good project to use them in)

*Mod Podge

*Paintbrush

*Stickers or other embellishments (optional)

*Large needle

*Jump rings

*Round nose pliers

*Other pliers

*Scissors and/or X-acto knife

Directions:

*Based on the size of your hanger, determine the number and size of rectangles you want to use in your project.  Cut out however many sections of foam board in the size you deem appropriate.

*Cut strips of patterned paper that are the same size as the foam board rectangles and use Mod Podge or other adhesive to stick the paper to the foam rectangles.

*Crop photos into rectangular shapes slightly smaller than the foam rectangles and adhere to the patterned paper.

*Coat the decorated side of the foam rectangles and let dry.  After they dry, you may wish to apply a second or third coat of Mod Podge to give rectangles a nice, glossy finish.

*Once dry, decorate with stickers or other embellishments if you so choose. 

*Using a large needle, poke a hole through the top part of each foam rectangle.  Using the pliers, pull open the jump ring, then slide it through the hole.  Do not close.

*Snip off the head of a headpin and use round pliers to make a loop at the base.

*Decorate headpin with beads, then make a loop at the other end wide enough to fit around the hanger.  Close around hanger. 

*Slide other end of the headpin through the jump ring on one of the rectangles, then close the jump ring.  You should now have one rectangle hanging from the hanger.

*Repeat process with the remainder of the head pins.