DIY Photo Art

Have you ever had DIY deja vu? Well, that is exactly what happened to me when I decided to fake a giant photo canvas of my kids for the playroom. If you remember my post about putting song lyrics on a canvas, you know that I ran into a few snags. Needless to say, it was far from perfect and neither is our photo canvas but I have resolved not to point out every flaw because sometimes I am the only one that notices them.With that said, allow me to explain how I made this piece.

I have recently fallen in love with Jenny's blog, Little Green Notebook. She recently mentioned her $4.00 photo trick that I decided to duplicate. To begin, I had a 36x48 inch engineering print of the photo made at staples. I also picked up a foam board similar in size. I actually had to use a trifold board because it was all that I could find that was the right size. I found mine at Michaels but I'm sure you can get them at any craft store. I could have used a canvas but the foam board is much less expensive and I'm all about that.  I trimmed the photo and the foam board so that they were the same size.

Cutting the foam board was a little tricky. An exacto knife would have been the tool of choice but I couldn't find mine (in a box somewhere I'm sure) so I just used a kitchen knife.

As you can see, the edges were a mess so I put masking top over them to make for a smoother surface.

I loved Jenny's idea of painting the edge so I did the same. I wanted a nice reddish-orange color so I just did a little color mixing until I got a shade I was happy with. Painting past the edge was a major fail, by the way.

Once the paint dried, I attached the photo to the board with mod podge. I didn't get pictures of this step but I just started with the print rolled up and glued it down as I unrolled it onto the foam board. This is where things got extremely hairy for me. I realized that the orange paint could be seen through the print and there were a ton of air bubbles underneath where I didn't apply enough mod podge. It was completely unsalvagable. So, I scrapped it and did the entire process all over again. The second round went much better. Like I mentioned before, however, the end result isn't perfect but I'll let you be the judge of that. I do love the surprise of orange around the edges.

So, back to school is looming for me. I am excited to be in a new school and a new grade level this year but that also means that I have a lot of work to do between now and August 19th when twenty-some new first graders will walk into my classroom for the first time. I will try to update you throughout the process. Goodbye summer and hello to my crazy, busy, rewarding, and amazing life as a teacher!