Do you remember twenty years ago, how exciting it was to get a roll of film developed and see what was on it?

(Wow…did I just say, “do you remember twenty years ago?!” Boy does that make me feel O.L.D.!!!)

I can recall picking up the pictures at the store and not even being able to wait until I got home to tear that envelope open and see what was inside! Of course, there were usually a few pictures that didn’t turn out as well as I’d hoped, but there were always tons that I liked, and I had so many smiles and laughs looking through them. I remember showing them to people who came over to visit, putting them into albums, and of course picking a favorite or two to to put in a frame.

While digital photography is amazing in so many ways (of course, it’s fantastic to be able to realize right away that you caught someone mid-blink), it’s kind of sad that so often we no longer bother to get the pictures developed. Admit it…you have tons of pictures that you love buried on a hard drive!

I know for me personally, I have literally thousands of pictures of my kids that I have totally forgotten about. Occasionally when I am organizing my portfolio or cleaning up my hard drive, I will sort through them and get all sentimental over them. But really, they are doing me little good stored on my computer! I look through them once a year or so, and my husband and kids NEVER see them. I do pretty much all of my editing when my kids are napping or in bed for the night, so quite often my kids never even see the pictures I take of them unless it happens to be one I print for the wall. This makes me really sad! My husband also pointed out last fall that we had an embarrassing lack of pictures on our walls, especially considering I am a photographer. In my defense, we moved to this house a little over two years ago when I was eight months pregnant, and between starting up my business and all of the craziness that goes along with being a stay at home mom to three, I just hadn’t gotten around to it! Well, thanks to Pinterest, I knew exactly what I wanted to do about this problem!

I had seen a picture of Ana White’s Ten Dollar Ledges a year or so ago and loved the look.

http://ana-white.com/2010/10/plans/ten-dollar-ledges

Even better? Materials were relatively cheap, and the shelves were pretty easy to put together (Or should I say, they were pretty easy to make my husband put together, LOL. Thanks for always humoring me and helping me with my crazy ideas, Bill!).

I spent months collecting any cheap picture frames I could find. Thanks to my wonderful mother, I had a pretty good start on a collection because she gave me a lot when she was moving and getting rid of them. For the rest, I grabbed any 25 or 50 cent frames I could find at yard sales all throughout last summer.

One of my favorite things about the way that this project turned out is actually that the frames are not all matchy-matchy. I love that there are all different shapes and sizes, and some of them have such detail and character. To make them all coordinate with each other and the rest of our decor, I just spray painted them with the same  paint I used for the frame that holds our large family photo that also hangs in the living room. I only remembered to take a picture when I was about halfway in to this process, but hopefully you get the idea.

After painting them all, they now match perfectly…but not TOO perfectly!

And of course my MOST favorite thing about my new picture wall is that now I have a wonderful place to display some of my favorite photos! There are tons of pictures of my three favorite little people now gracing my wall, and it will be easy to add to whenever I get a new favorite.

Here are a few shots of the finished project.

I hope that it inspires at least one person to get those pictures off of the computer and on to the wall!