For a long time now I have wanted to make a growth chart for my girls. I love the idea of just marking in a doorway how tall the little beans are, but I know we won’t be here in this house forever, so I wanted to do something portable. I contemplated sewing a nice chart, but that idea didn’t really captivate me. But then, I was watching TV and I saw someone who did mark her kids’ heights on the wall and had that part of her wall removed. Then I had it! A piece of wood.
My father in law left a piece of wood at our house that was just perfect…and perfectly free (after I asked permission to use it). I wanted to keep the wood natural, but still paint something fun on it. So, Scott sanded it down for me. He rounded the edges a little bit and got it just perfect for me to paint.
The first step was to make my ruler markings on one of the edges. So, I did that and then carefully painted each line.
The next step was to figure out what theme we wanted for our growth chart. We threw out many possibilities at breakfast the next morning…a tree, a house, flowers, a giraffe, a raining cloud…but finally we decided on a tree. Chloe added the idea of putting apples in the tree, which gave me another idea….to use those precious little finger prints for the apples.So, I painted the tree trunk. For all the paint, I just used a regular acrylic paint. Then we put green paint on a piece of tile. We each put our palms in the paint and made sure they were covered. And we used our hands to add the leaves of the tree. It turned out fabulous!!! The effect of paint on hands is so cool because the hand print distributes the paint in such a way that it adds great texture, which is perfect for leaves. After the paint dried, we added the apples with our finger tips. We added some falling out of the tree.
On the very bottom, I painted a basket of apples, grass, and some daisies (I love me some daisies!). When I thought I was done, I got a terrific idea (if I do say so myself). And I “carved” our initials into the tree.
The last step was to varnish it. I used a clear, water based varnish.This entire project was done with things we already had in our house! Free! And for frugal me, this is the best kind of project to do.I have to say that this whole thing turned out better than I imagined it. And I will forever have those darling handprints and fingerprints on that board. It’ll mark their growth and is just such a wonderful reminder of their childhood. *sniff, sniff*
