This was not a quick, easy project. I've been researching the proper way to do it since we moved in. So, five months in the making. First I gathered all the frames that would be included. The good thing was, I had plenty. (The only thing we purchased for this project was a couple of cans of spray paint.) I took all the pictures and glass out of the frames so Dave could spray paint them. I also FINALLY found a letter M on Etsy that I liked and he also painted that. By the way, he used a technique I found on Pinterest where you stick thumb tacks in the back of the frame to elevate it so you can get all sides at once.
THEN, I traced each frame on paper. Lucky for me, I had a Scentsy order and used the packing paper from that (reduce, REUSE, recycle)! I arranged the papers on the wall, rearranged, measured the distance between each to make sure it was really even, and rearranged again until it all made a big, even rectangle.
This is what it looked like:
The two little ones on the bottom didn't fit, so they will just go somewhere else.
Now it was time to clean up the glass and put all the pictures back in. I also popped off that flap on the back of the table top frames because they don't hang as flat on the wall with that on there.
Oh, something that made this easy was that there wasn't a lot of pressure to not make too many holes in the wall because we're going to paint in the *very* near future. So, I'll stick some toothpicks in the holes to keep, and we'll patch and paint the rest.
I know this is a super long post, but you have to understand how excited I was to finish this. He won't ever admit it, but I think Dave hates hanging pictures for me because if I know it's not exactly centered, I can't stand it. If I don't know (like, if I'm not right there with him hanging it or we don't actually measure with a tape measure) then it's fine.
Lucky for us, Dave has this nifty little laser level that he nailed onto the wall (who cares about the extra hole, we're painting as soon as I choose a color . . . that could be a whole other post) that shot one straight line across the whole wall. Then we used another trick I learned on Pinterest and stuck a nail in a yard stick, hung the picture on that nail, put it in place, took the picture off the yard stick nail, tapped on it lightly to make a mark on the wall, and then knew exactly where to put the permanent nail.
And, here's the final product. I'll post more pictures when we paint. There are still a couple of things I'll add to it, but that will wait until after the paint!
I will also switch out some pictures. The important part was getting the frames on the wall; the rest is easy and more fun!
