Let me start off by saying....I have had the idea of doing this in my head since we lived in our old house....over 3 years ago! I knew I wanted to do it somewhere here, but didn't know where or even how exactly.
I got the idea from Tara Whitney...an Orange County photographer. I found her blog somewhere along the way. ;)
Anyway- she used 9- 20x20 clip frames from Ikea. That sounded simple enough. And at a good price. Well...not so much. By the time I originally got around to try to make something happen...I could not find them. I thought maybe they were out of stock....only to find out a good while later that they did not carry them anymore. Uuh!
So I started looking for other clip frames. They couldn't be that expensive, right? Well- it seemed like they were (at least where I was looking, I guess)
Until one day I was at Michael's...and they had their 11x14 clip frames on clearance! They only had 7...but I figured surely I'd be able to find 2 somehow else (which I did find at another store, but they were not clearance). I think I ended up spending about $36 total on all of the frames....which comes out to about $4 a piece which I was very happy with!
So I think we bought the frames last summer some time....and Geoff hung them up fairly quickly....and they have just sat there. Empty. For the longest time. Going through and finding pictures I wanted to use was a little difficult. Almost half of them are actually instagram photos! I've said it before and I'm sure I'll say it again...phone photos turn out to be some of my favorites.
Then there was the whole figuring out how to apply the TTV frames in photoshop (a great link to a tutorial that I used provided on Tara Whitney's post). Let me tell you...if you have Photoshop...the 'free transform' action/capability (whatever you call it) is wonderful! I don't know much about photoshop but I use Free Transform all of the time now.
I printed a few prints at Mpix because they really are beautiful prints...but I quickly discovered that it was just going to be too expensive to do that....especially if I wanted the freedom to be able to replace photos as I wanted (not too frequently, but I wanted the option and spending lots of money would have made me feel like I could not). Then I discovered Costco Photocenter! I'm sure I'm the last one to do so...but if you haven't used them....they are great quality and a great price!
There are a few shots I'd like to replace...but most of these are some of my favorites.
....like this one in the middle of Parker (almost 2 years old) and Geoff at our Galveston beach vacation back in 2009. Love it.
I feel like this wall adds so much to the room and I'm so glad to finally have it completed!
5 comments:
I loved all your decorations! I may or may not steal this idea.... probably quite a long time from now, but still!
I noticed these the other day and it is just great! Love them!
I loved your whole house! I think you are so good at this decorating thing. I have been bragging to people about you and your talent! Love it all!
I love this idea!!
I found you linked up at Chef in Training's party!
Beth @ The First Year Blog
ooooh i LOVE this version of a gallery wall....now I need to find wall space in my house to make one! thanks for the inspiration! www.camillecolumbia.blogspot.com
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