I saw these fun accordions and decided to merge them with with a project I had started the day before…

Here is the end result…

a fun magnetic board…

Here are some close-ups…

This project had a lot of different inspirations…I first found these free journal card dowloads

and had them printed at PaperCoterie on their photo posters:

“Surprise the ones you love with personalized wall art that shows how much you care. Just upload their favorite photo, or one with you together, to make a long-lasting gift. These durable, breathable fabric posters are made with a special adhesive so they will stick and re-stick to virtually any surface. Plus they won't crumple, tear, or fade. Make every day special with personalized posters.”

I bought them when they were free and just had to pay shipping. Paper Coterie regularly has coupon codes…I find most of mine at Hip2Save…so for four posters I paid a total of 18 dollars in shipping…

I then went to the Home Depot and purchased some pre-cut sheets of metal…They did not have 13x20 which is the size of the posters so I purchased the 12x18 and folded the excess over the edges…The metal sheets were a total of 20 dollars…

I then found the gold and peeling flock of birds (I don’t have a before picture) at a church yard sale for .50 cents…and put two light coats of flat gray paint on them…spray paint 2.50

Then I followed this tutorial on how to make the accordion circles…you can make two 6 inch circles out of one sheet of 12x12 paper (cut into 4 3inch strips) but it takes 2 full pages of 12x12 paper to make a 12 inch one (cut into four 6 inch strips)…once you have folded a couple you get in a groove and they don’t take very long…I used my bone folder to make the creases crisp, I also think that the bone folder keeps your fingers from getting tired…you could also substitute the bone folder with a ruler…

using the hot glue gun I glued the edges of the accordion pieces together and made the circle…this for me was the HARDEST PART, I think there is some kind of trick that I don’t understand but I just kept trying unitl it magically became the circle and then I squirted a whole bunch of hot glue into the center, and squeezed until it was dry…

here is a picture of the back of a finished circle I put a middle piece on the back because I hot glued the circles to the wall and this gave me a good surface to put the hot glue…

I used my revolution

some sticky magnetic sheets and the Clementine cardstock from Project Life…

to make the alphabet and number magnets…

I used 3m picture Velcro things (my favorite EVER, they don’t damage the wall and can hold quite a bit of weight) to hold up the magnetic boards (click picture for source)…in total these were 9 dollars, a bit expensive but, to me, the ease and no nail holes make it worth it…

using the width of the level to keep an equal distance between the boards…Then I used hot glue to add the birds and circles…

BEFORE…

AFTER…

all told this project cost 50 dollars…less than it would have cost to get the posters themselves from Paper Coterie at full cost ($74 including shipping)…I already had the 12x12 cardstock, the magnetic sheets, the hot glue gun, and the revolution…

I think it is pretty good…there are things I’d like to tweak…and I would have liked it to have been center on that wall but we have a corner cabinet…Those circles were very easy to make and have such a great impact!

what do you think?

The winner of the Photo Stack paper (click to see more pictures)

never contacted me with her information so I am going to have a re-give away…I have it all packaged up and just need a winner’s address to send it off…I will post the giveaway tomorrow night with my new Project Life post…

Until Later…