Day 1 of CHALLENGE Decorative Floating Initial Hair Accessory Holder

My daughters 8th Birthday is coming up and I thought I would make something for her room. We are going to redecorate it in blacks, browns, and beiges. Neutral colors are best, because we will be staging our home soon for moving. To start off with here are the supplies,

1. 2 8x10 in Plain wood picture frames from the dollar store, will be using 1 of the frames and both pieces of glass.

2. Tacky glue (was out of hot glue)

3. A wood initial, I chose an A.

4. Fancy scrapbooking paperclamps.

5. Black, ivory, and clear matte finish Krylon spray paint.

6. 4 screw hooks

7. Scrapbook paper, fancy glittery and textured

8. Various Beads

9. Various ribbons

10. Various stencil shapes

11. Scrapbook mounting squares

Now let's get started

First make sure all glass is cleaned and fingerprint free. Next cut scrapbook paper into 6x4 rectangle. Add scrapbook mounting squares to the back, each corner and 2 in between each corner and 2 in the middle. Peel off squares and center onto one of the pieces of glass. Shown here:

Add glue to each corner, I would have added hot glue, (the best for this project in my opinion) but I was out so I used Aleene's Tacky glue. Sandwich 2nd piece of glass over top making sure all corners are even. I then used the paperclamps to squeeze the glass together for drying. Shown here:

 Now, I added the Screw hooks before I took it outside to Spray paint. I needed to use a hammer to gently get the screw started, then twisted them into place. I used 4 and eyeballed the placement.

I also added the paperclamps I used earlier for the

glass and glued them to the frame.

I then painted 3 coats of black satin Krylon to the frame and the initial, then I used the stencils as a negative and laid them down randomly on the black frame, sprayed a little bit and it gave a unique effect.
I sprayed the frame with a final coat of Clear Matte Krylon.

I added the glass to the picture frame, since it does not have a back to it, I had to carefully fold over the staples on the back, but not all the way so I wouldn't break the glass. I added the various beads to the corners. I also tied bows interlocking all the ribbons together. Glued that to the glass in the corner of the 6x4 paper and glued the A right next to it.

Shown here:

Here is the final product, you could then add a picture hanger to the back to hang on the wall.

Organizing Photos

This process is a little lengthy. What I have found is to just dive in and get started to keep the momentum going. I figured out an easy system anyone can do, low cost, and gets the photos out of the developing envelopes and shoeboxes that are typical storage for your photos. You get to show them off finally!! Here's the final product:

I started off by separating photos and memorabilia by child, me, hubby, family and pets. This was done over medium sized baskets and bins, for sorting out. Seen here:

** I am avid scrapbooker, but now do it digitally when I have the time. The problem I found with scrapbooking is that it made the process of getting photos into albums, take forever and I finally gave up. I tend to be a perfectionist, because afterall these are my photos and a 2 page layout would take me sometimes 3 hours with all of the cutting, pasting and such. Way to long. I really wanted my kids to see themselves whenever they wanted and no matter how many roles of film they were placed where they were visible. 


So I separated the photos and memorabilia then I sorted all of the memorabilia into a designated art/school/memorabilia file tote for each child and adult

I then put school photos, sports photos and anything oversized into 3-ring binders and page protectors, this is  a great system that you can move around easily if needed. 

Then I Got Photo Albums at Michaels craft storehttp://michaels.com/art/online/home that were 40% off at the time

They display 5~ 4x6 photos on each page

I then cut up sheets of beautiful patterned papers that are glitterized and foiled for my daughters scrapbook pages, they come in tablet form in 12x12 sheets and I cut them down to 8 1/2 x 11 size for the page protectors also at Michaels. The binders I've used you can customize with papers on the cover and a strip on the side and another sheet for the back. I did this for future scrapbooking and they have in tablet form the same type papers in 4x6 size, just rip one off and stick photo to it then to scrapbook page. Easy!!

Heres some of the pretty papers also found at Michaels craft store or Joanns www.joanns.com

How beautiful are these?

Heres a pic of all of them together

Another

Now a boys version

Well if you have any questions or comments, feel free to leave them here. Thanks for looking and I hope that I have helped some of you out. 'Ciao PS My kids love to look at themselves now and not lost in the shuffle.