When my sister-in-law told me that she thought some sort of menu planning "thing" would be good, I started researching menu boards, and apparently, I totally missed the Pinterest fad last year when everyone was making them. I guess that's what I get for growing up in a place where we always caught onto the trends a year later. ;)
Anyway, I love this gift, and so I'm going to show you how I made mine.
Materials you'll need
plywood or painter's canvas
jigsaw (if using wood)
fabric
12x9 metal sheet from The Home Depot
nails
hammer
scrapbook paper
ribbon
flat glass marbles
magnets
stickers
staple gun
Modge Podge (or in my case the homemade version which is one part glue -Elmer's white glue works well- to half part water)
hot glue gun
picture hanger
First, you need some sort of base. Many of the boards I saw either used a cookie sheet to make it magnetic, a piece of wood or particle board and used clothes pins to hold the recipes, or a covered painter's canvas. I decided I liked the magnetic idea, but NOT the cookie sheet. Not all cookie sheets are magnetic, and I think they look tacky. However, to be perfectly honest, I really needed something that would fit in a flat-rate box since I was mailing it to New York.
I ended up choosing a piece of plywood that I found lying around and measured it to fit inside a medium flat-rate box (13x11). My husband cut it with our jigsaw for me.
I called my sister-in-law to find out her kitchen's color scheme, and thankfully, she wasn't picky about colors. I decided to go with red, black, and cream. That inspiration hit me in the middle of the night. It was then that I realized I had all of the materials that I needed.
I then got started on the magnets so they would have time to dry. I decided to make the homemade glass magnets for the days of the week. To make them, you can find a tutorial here: Easy kids craft: Conversation Marble Magnets.
After the "Modge Podge" dried, I used Aleene's craft glue to glue the magnets on. They are heavy-duty magnets I bought at The Home Depot, I believe. Don't use hot glue to attach the magnets because they will just rip off after a while. Find a good glue like Aleene's or Gorilla Glue. I used the clothes pins as clamps. I let the glue dry overnight, and so I worked on the rest of the board while those were drying.
I cut the fabric larger than the board and then stapled it on the back.
Then I turned over the board and nailed the metal sheet onto the left side of my menu board (sorry the picture is dark and turned, but you get the idea). I left some space at the top of the board. Since plywood is difficult to nail into, my nails bent at the end; but I didn't mind because I had a plan to cover them anyway.
I then cut a piece of scrapbook paper and glued it to the top of the board. I think I might have used craft glue for that. While it covered the metal sheet, I knew that my magnets were strong enough to go through the paper and the ribbon (that I added in the next step).
Using my glue gun, I glued the ribbon across the bottom end of the scrapbook paper and across the bottom of the metal board to cover the nails. I used craft glue to reinforce it.
I then flipped it over and stapled the ribbon so it wouldn't just fall off.
Using scrapbook paper and stickers, I made the "Menu" label. I glued it on with the modge podge mixture I had.
Next, flip over the board and find the center of the board, and attach a hanger so the board can be hung on the wall. You could probably do this last, but I did it near the beginning.
Then I took another coordinating piece of scrapbook paper and stapled it to the back to hide all of the fabric and ribbon ends.
I decided to add another strip of scrapbook paper across the ribbon on the bottom to hide the nails even more and to add a little bit more character. I like how it turned out.
Finally, I needed a place to put blank strips of paper so my in-laws can add their recipes. I just folded scrapbook paper to make an envelope and stapled and glued it on. Yes, I'm a little staple happy. :) Many of the other tutorials recommended a box, such as a crayon box, and I liked that idea, but I didn't have one, and I didn't feel like buying crayons just for that purpose. I already have an infinite amount of loose crayons.
The next morning when the magnets were dry, I added them to the board.
I'm so happy with this project! Hopefully, my in-laws like it as much as I do. I only wish I had better lighting in my kitchen so I could have gotten better pictures. . . oh, well, lesson learned!
