DIY Travel-Inspired Alphabet Cards

The most ambitious nursery project I took on was the creation of alphabet cards based on our world travels. It’s important to me for our son to have an understanding of the world around him and a desire to explore it, but before he gets to that point he’s got to learn his ABCs!

My original inspiration was this print by Oopsy Daisy:

art by Oopsy Daisy via projectnursery.com

I wanted to make something that would have a big impact in the room, and figured that with all the trips between the Mr. and I, surely we’d have enough locations to cover all the letters of the alphabet. We came so close! My bestie contributed the letter “U” since Mr. JC didn’t have a photo of a ski trip to Utah that he went on years ago. He hung all of the cards on Sunday night, and we’re really happy with how they look. The cards will be a fun way to teach Junior the alphabet and geography while also sharing stories about the places we’ve been. Not to mention that it’s a unique way to display so many vacation and work trip photos. Here’s how the project went down:

Materials:

• Photos from your travels
• Foam board
• Photo paper for your printer (I used matte paper by Staples and am pleased with the quality)
• X-acto knife
• Yard stick
• Large cutting board so you won’t ruin your table
• Scrapbook tape (I used this)
• Removable poster mounting squares
• Laser level

Step 1: Create your design. I am no graphic artist by any means, and used MS Publisher to design the cards.

Step 2: Print the cards on photo paper. I chose matte photo paper to cut down on glare, and stuck with a regular 8.5″x11″ size. This made the installation absolutely gigantic, but it was the easiest option.

Step 3: Using the yard stick and foam board, measure out the size of the card. I used six 20″x30″ pieces of board for this project.

Step 4: Put a large cutting board underneath, and cut the foam board carefully by applying firm, even pressure with the X-acto knife. Trust me, if the pressure isn’t even you’ll get a jagged edge.

Step 5: Apply the scrapbook adhesive to the back of the alphabet card, along the edges and across the middle, and mount to the board.

Step 6: Mount to the wall with removable poster mounting squares. A laser level will make it easy to mount the cards evenly. We spaced ours 1″ apart, and did some math to to ensure the whole installation was centered on the wall.

I’m so very happy that we completed this project before Junior’s arrival! It will be a while before he can understand or appreciate it, but in the meantime we’ll enjoy looking at all the photos.