How do you welcome your students to school? My favorite idea that I found on Pinterest before school started last year was a back to school frame. I just HAD to make one to take pictures of my new kinders at kindergarten open house! Even if you don’t think you’re crafty, this is a super easy project and you can have it finished in one day! So, I’m linking up with Monday Made it to share this simple back to school idea with you!
I don’t have photos about how I created it, but I’ll do my best to give you a run through.
Supplies:
~wooden frame (Michael’s)
~acrylic paint (Michael’s)
~bulletin board letters (Lakeshore)
~mod podge or hot glue (Michael’s)
~velcro dots (Lakeshore)
First, I painted the frame with two coats of acrylic paint. Once it was completely dry (only took about an hour!), I positioned my bulletin board letters on the frame. You can make your frame say whatever you want. I chose “1st day of kindergarten,” but you can have yours say “1st day of school” or “welcome to school”- totally up to you!
I LOVED my sparkly letters, but didn’t like how they weren’t very defined, so I outlined each letter with a black Sharpie. This took the longest, but was definitely worth the results.
Then, I used mod podge to glue all of my letters in place, but I used the velcro dots to secure the “1st.” Why? Because I wanted to be able to change “1st” to “last” at the end of the year!
And that’s all, folks! How easy?! The one change that I’m going to make this year is adding handles to the back. My kinders had a tough time figuring out how to hold onto the frame, especially since my letters spilled off the edges a bit. {Except this little kiddo, she was a pro!}
The parents absolutely LOVED these photos. I uploaded them to our class website, and I got so much positive feedback. Because of that, I made sure to not forget to take the “last day of kindergarten” photos during the crazy busy last day of school! Okay, I lied, I almost completely forgot! Boy was I glad that all I had to do was remove the velcro letters and velcro on my “last” piece! Phew! Here is how the frame looked on the last day of kindergarten:
I hope I’ve inspired some of you to tackle this back to school project this year! I’d love to hear about your cute ideas for the first day of school or orientation. Did anyone else brave the frames?
