Growing Every Day: A Personalized Growth Chart

She's getting tall!

When Zara was a baby, I scoured stores and websites looking for a perfect growth chart that didn't cost a bundle. I couldn't find anything. Seán suggested that since I was crafty, maybe I could make one. Well, that got me thinking. I loved the idea of doing my own, but couldn't figure out what to make it from. I searched the house and the outbuildings trying to get an idea. And then I stumbled onto the pieces of laminate wood we had leftover from doing our living room, kitchen, and bedroom floors. Perfect!


Ingredients:

• 1 piece of laminate wood flooring
• Sandpaper
• E6000 or another heavy duty glue
• Acrylic paint
• Sawtooth hanger
• Mod Podge
• Tissue papers
• Permanent marker
• Wood (or MDF) letters to spell out the child's name
• Tape measure

I lightly sanded the laminate wood flooring and gave it a quick coat of white acrylic paint, letting the brush strokes show. While that was drying, I decorated the letters. The letters with the dots were covered just on the front with the tissue paper and Mod Podge. The solid colored ones were covered completely. After the solid colored letters dried, I used a permanent marker to make stitch marks in a deeper shade.

Stitch marks added with a permanent marker.

When everything dried, I glued the letters onto the board, and after that dried, I glued a sawtooth picture hanger to the back.

The back. Not as pretty as the front.

And then after everything dried, I hung the growth chart. That's when I used a measuring tape and a permanent marker to mark the correct intervals. Feel free to get fancier with this part.

Zara's gotten so much taller this past year.

If your child's name is long, you could use smaller letters. They come in all different sizes. The ones I used are six inches tall.

The finished growth chart.