DIY bulletin boards

 Last month, I re-did my office/craft area and I was perplexed with this large blank area on the wall. 

I thought about a nice vinyl or rub-on saying thing... maybe something about being creative or family or something. But I was also missing my kids' artwork that I had previously had plastered all over my one wall in there. However, I did NOT want this room to look cluttered like it had. My friend told me about using this foam insulation board as bulletin boards so I thought I'd try it.

 I went to Menard's and purchased this giant lavendar foam insulation board for about $9. 

It was so big that it wouldn't fit in my van so I had to cut it in the parking lot with a utility knive! It was also extremely lightweight and I giggled a lot at the sight of me trying to handle this ginormous thing myself. Luckily a friend of ours works there and he helped me out with getting it into my van. My family thought I was completely nuts when I walked in the front door with this thing!

 I measured my space and  figured out how big I could have it... and decided on four separate boards, one for each of my children's artwork. So I set to work cutting the foamboards with a utility knive to the sizes I wanted. (I had some pretty significant pieces leftover even! That thing was HUGE!)

 Then I attached simple lightweight fabric with these silver thumbtacks.

 And WA-LA! They were ready to hang. 

 They hung up really easily since they are so lightweight and I love being able to display large pieces of their artwork and can easily change it out... which Luke has already changed his out once he brought his stuff home from school at the end of the year. And Elli has done more and I've added some more to hers too. I even covered a smaller piece of it with a striped fabric scrap I had leftover from the curtain in there for a small bulletin board for Elli above her little desk. 

I filled up this huge space for around $20! And it was SO easy to do.