DIY Art

I know, I know - it's been a while! I would like to officially declare that my only goal in life right now is for Ms. Susanna to sleep through the night and me to get my brains back! I'm also at a standstill on household projects, thus without much to blog about - don't even get me started there. I do have a few posts to do over the next few days though, so here goes with the first...

I am already working with Mark on his alphabet, and saw these cute alphabet prints by Penny People Designs that inspired me to make my own...

If you have any simple Word or Photoshop skills, you can make your own! No matter your skill level, you can do it! Just keep it simple if you have to. Or, frame a verse, quote or a single word!

Another idea: use a photocopier instead and make one of these super easy monogram prints like Young House Love did...

Anyway, I decided I wanted to make a print showing the entire alphabet, and since I am OCD, I wanted all the letters to be plain, simple and accurate. I found a free font I liked on Dafont, called Writing Stuff. If you don't know how to download fonts, foggetaboutit! Just use the ones you have in Word. You don't have to be fancy or technical to make something cute.

Once I installed the font I had downloaded, I typed out the alphabet, formatted it the way I wanted, and saved it. You need to save it to something portable (CDR or thumb-drive) because you are going to want to take it to a print shop to have it laser printed in color and on nice paper to really get a good look. Or you could call the print shop and see if you can email it to them.

Note: If you do download a font, chances are the print shop will not have that font. You need to be sure to either save the file as a PDF (it's like an image rather than text data) or be sure to also save the font with the file, and the print shop can download it too, to be sure your artwork comes out just as you designed it!

After I had the art printed at my local Ben Franklin, I chose a cheap Ikea frame, and, wa-la!

I need something else to bring in some texture on the dresser, but I like the print there, I think.

Plus, it is an educational reference and piece of artwork in one! I chose to do the vowels in the accent color I used in the room...

What do you think? Wanna DIY some of your own art?

Okay, on a totally separate subject... I just have to say, Mark got a new toy that is wrong in so many ways...

Not the least of which are that I am the one who bought it for him (dollar bin at Target), and I also bought him a gi-normous bee, grasshopper and dragon fly. Sick.