Well... I actually made something not too long ago.
It’s a growth chart that looks like a ruler! As a kid, we always marked on a door frame at my great aunt’s house. I LOVED doing this, seeing how much taller I was getting each time we would visit. However, I wanted one that I could take with us if we moved, and also one that wasn’t primary colors. I first saw this idea on an email from HGTV that led me to their designer blog. So I pinned it, and it sat on my board for a couple of months. Then, in the same day, I saw 2 tutorials on Pinterest. The first one was from Naptime Decorator, and I loved it. After I read her instructions, I was a little bummed, because I didn’t have stencil numbers. Then I found one from 517 Creations, and the instructions told me how to get the numbers to look authentic. Fantastic! I wanted to tweak each a little bit, so here's my DIY instructions.
1. Have some handyman help!
My father-in-law just happens to build houses and anything that is made of wood. So, I cruised out to his shed, picked out some wood that looked good and had him cut it to 6 1/2 feet tall. I wanted the growth chart to kind of make a statement in a room, so I didn’t want it to be small. He and my husband planed the board and sanded it down nice and smooth for me. They also drilled a hole about a 1/2 foot from the top and bottom. You can kind of see it in the picture below. I'm pretty sure you can have people at Lowe's/Home Depot/Menards/etc do this for you for a small fee.
2. Measure, measure, then measure again.
I started out working in the kitchen on the tile, but quickly figured out that the TV and comfy carpet were in the living room. And after 5 minutes my knees were screaming at me. I wanted my ruler to look like an old-timey ruler, so made fewer marks than are shown on the others. I want to hang this chart 6 inches off the floor, so my first ‘inch’ (foot) mark was actually 6 inches from the bottom of the board. I made all of my foot marks first, then came back and made a mark at 3 inches, 6 inches, and 9 inches from each foot mark. The 3 and 9 marks are the 1/4 inch and the 6 mark is the 1/2 inch mark.
My lovely helper decided to add her own special artwork.
Outside to the sander, back to work.
3. Make your marks.
I started making the marks with my square, but they were bleeding everywhere, so I flipped the board over and started over on the other side. I grabbed a thank you card and measured my lengths on it, so I didn’t have to use the square. I folded it up so that I would have straight lines. I made my inch marks 3 inches long, 1/2 marks 1 1/2 inches long, and my 1/4 marks 1 inch long. I used a pencil to mark them all out first.
Then, I took my poster pen (like a sharpie) and traced the marks and made them larger. I highly recommend outlining first, then filling in. The marks didn’t bleed as bad when I did this.
4. Find your font
I got onto Word and searched for some numbers that screamed old school ruler to me. I ended up using Modern No. 20 as my font and the size is 260. I printed the numbers and cut off the excess paper on the top. At first, I took a pencil and traced the back of the number
then lined them up 2 inches down on my foot marks and about 1/4 of an inch away. I took a ball point pen and traced the front of the number, which transfers the pencil marks onto the board.
Then, I traced the number with my poster pen (again, do the outside first, then inside.)
After awhile, I figured out that I could just scribble over the back with the pencil, and then whatever I traced with the pen would be what transferred. MUCH faster.
Without the handyman help, this project took me two days. I worked on most of it during my daughter's naptime. After it was all dried, I applied two separate coats of polyurethane.
And there you have it!
An awesome, portable growth ruler for your kiddos that you won’t mind displaying in the living parts of your house!
No comments:
Post a Comment