A New Craft Project: Paper Mache Map Letter!

A whopping 30 weeks ago, I pinned these cute fabric letters from Maillardville Manor onto my crafts board on Pinterest.  Since that time, I've been thinking about a way to incorporate them into our home.  Last month, I was supposed to go for a mom's night out of crafting and decided I would make a letter B using maps.  It was close to Valentine's Day, too, so I decided to focus on places the hubby and I have visited since we have known each other. I thought it would be a great, inexpensive Valentine's Day present for him and a sweet reminder of all the great times we have shared together.

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I went to Jo-Ann Fabric and purchased a plain 12 inch paper mache letter.  It was around $3 and was the only one I could find in town.  I was surprised that neither AC Moore or Michaels had them available.  Once I had the letter, I started searching the internet for maps of special places we had visited.  I decided to print them out on regular printer paper in black and white.  I was super tempted to do color maps, but ultimately decided that everything would look more cohesive in one color.  I printed out 15-20 pages of maps and then started playing around with trimmed down versions on the letter itself.  Excuse the poor quality of this iPhone photo...it was the best I could do at the time.

Once I had the maps trimmed, I started using Mod Podge to apply the paper to the letter.  I trimmed as needed with an x-acto knife and slowly worked my way around the letter being extra careful in the curves.  Within an hour or two, I had the letter totally covered with maps and adhered with the Mod Podge.  I let it dry overnight and went back the next day and gave the whole thing one more heavy coat of Mod Podge to protect the paper maps.  Here's the final product!

            

I absolutely love the way it turned out and Mr. Man was thrilled with it, too.  He loves looking at maps and books about places we have visited so it was a very fitting gift for him.  Now, I just need to get back in gear and work on our gallery wall I've been planning FOREVER so we have a special place to hang it.  Have I mentioned how good it feels to be crafting a little again?!  It's like things are almost "normal".  :)

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