The Cheat Sheet

As a math teacher, I am generally pretty good with numbers. I remember dates well, even ones that may not be that important to anyone else. My husband is a smart man, but dates are not his thing. Shortly after we got married, I decided to remedy that problem by making him a cheat sheet. It couldn't any old cheat sheet, it had to be pretty enough to display on the wall. 

I played around in Word with different fonts until I found 4 that I liked. I used those fonts to write the dates of four milestones in our relationship. Then I printed them out on pretty gold paper and slapped them in a frame with a few photos from our wedding.  Here's what I ended up with:

I hung the frame in a prominent place in our home: the photo gallery wall. My husband laughed about this at first, but I think he secretly finds it useful!!

This was a super quick project and the only cost was that of the frame. I think it was definitely worth the time and money so I never spend an anniversary upset because someone forgot about it!

Do any of you have a way to subtly remind your significant other of important dates?

Thanks for reading,
Kathleen

No thinking required

 Projects that don't require a lot of thinking or planning are my favorite. I am a do-er. I like to start something and get immediate results. This photo gallery wall was one of those projects.  Photo walls were all over Pinterest. As I perused Pinterest from my couch, and stared at this big blank wall, I was inspired.

I had accumulated a lot of frames in the past several years. Most of them were dark - either brown or black. I gathered together all of these frames that did not yet have a home in our new house. I also bought a few new frames. The two oval shaped ones are from an antique store and originally had these horribly ugly flower prints in them. I used a tip that I saw online and traced the frames onto old newspapers and then played around with the arrangement on the wall until I was happy.

 Out came the hammer and nails and I just started hanging up the frames. My favorite part of this is that I can continue to add to the wall as I find new frames. There are some personal pictures included, but they do not overwhelm the wall. And of course there are words. I'm slightly obsessed with words. Bill thinks that's weird, especially since I'm a math teacher. Who knew math teachers could read?!

 It's hard to get a picture of the full wall because it's along the mini-hallway to our master bedroom. These were the best shots I could get.

I love displaying frames in groups. This is the largest gallery wall I currently have in our house and I love that it is just free flowing. I used to only put pictures up in a very orderly display, but I'm breaking out of that mold. This is more fun because it can be changed at any time by adding a new frame.

Have you tried any photo galleries on the large empty walls of your home? Give it a shot, its liberating! If you read this, leave me a comment. It seriously makes my day. I go screeching upstairs and tell Bill that someone actually commented! Not kidding.

Thanks for reading,
Kathleen

On the ledge

Yesterday, I showed you some free art that I created for the empty corner in our master bedroom. You also got a glimpse of the picture ledges that I hung to display some other frames. I had a special request (Thanks Kris!) to show those shelves head on.  Well, your wish is my command!

As I mentioned yesterday, I found the shelves at Lowe's. While I thought they were a bit expensive, they were the exact look I was going for. Plus, I knew that I wasn't going to spend a lot of money to fill them. Wow, I'm good at justifying spending money!

The ledges are only a few inches deep, so I knew I would need frames that just leaned against the wall.  I went into my frame cemetery craft room to find some frames to fit the bill. Several months ago I bought a few cheap black frames at JoAnn's. Like $3 cheap. For an 8 by 10 frame with a mat. I was excited. I also had a few frames leftover from college and my first apartment. I always knew it was a good idea to hang on to these things.

The only new piece that I bought for the shelves was the large Moroccan-style print. I found that at Home Goods, another favorite place of mine. Bill suggested that I use some velcro on the back of that frame to really hold it onto the wall. I heeded his advice since I did not want to be cleaning up glass if the frame ever did come crashing down.

When it came to actually putting the frames on the shelves, I just played around until I found an arrangement that I liked. Some of the frames overlap and I really like the look of that. I also like that the prints are all different, but they are tied together since they are all black and white. One of the frames is filled with leftover fabric from some pillows that I made for the bed. There are really no rules about what you can put on display!

 
 Before I bought the shelves, I had already hung that large bronze clock. I like the clock, but I'm not sure I like it in that spot.  Any opinions? By the way, the paint color in our bedroom is Valspar's City Storm. In real life, the color is a lot more gray than it photographs. I had the paint color-matched to the Olympic low VOC paint. It was my first time using the low VOC paint and it was ah-mazing. There were no fumes. At all. And it's cheaper than the normal Valspar paint. I'm in love.

What do you think of the picture ledges? Have you tried overlapping your frames and just leaning them against the wall? Is anyone else paranoid that they could all come crashing down at any second? By the by, if this isn't your thing, I'll be back later today with another option for displaying a great variety of frames.

Thanks for reading,
Kathleen