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I made this Halloween photo garland for my kitchen windows a couple years ago and just love it. It makes me get teary-eyed every time I see how these kids have grown. Andrew wouldn’t be caught dead in a cute cuddly elephant costume this year now that he is a cool 9 year old, but boy I’d like to smoosh him into one.
This is so easy to make, it just takes some time.
First I selected the photos I wanted to use from my computer files. I just used random Halloween photos from years past.
I use Picasa to edit my photos and just this year Picasa added even more cool editing choices to make this project easier than ever. To give my selected photos a vintagey, spooky feeling I added a white border and changed the coloring a little.
For this photo, you can see I selected the vignette (which puts that dark shadow around the photo) and added the white border and also chose the Orton-ish option to change the coloring. You can play around with all these options to come up with the look you want.
I had my photos printed out at the one-hour grocery store photo counter and picked up these supplies while I was out.
1. Ribbon and string for the garland. I chose string that had little black plastic balls on it…it works great for this project because it holds the photos where you want them to stay. (Found it at Hobby Lobby.) The ribbons I used for decoration on either side of the garland. (See window pic above.)
2. I used a small hole punch to create a hole in the photo.
3. I bought enough little lanyard-clip thingys to attach the photos to the string. (These are found in the jewelry aisle.)
I punched the holes, put the lanyard thingy in carefully, and strung the photos on the string. I rearranged the photos once I had the beaded string hanging to get the photos somewhat evenly spaced apart.
I love it! What a great way to display all your photos. And what cute photos they are. That elephant costume is so sweet!
SUPER CUTE!!!
I am so glad you posted this! I remember it from last year and wanted to make one. I LOVE it. I gotta get on this project. Happy October Sarah!
Love this idea! I'll definitely be doing this project.
loved this way back when…and love it even more now!
have a happy day sarah
Love this and the one you do st Christmas but it must be hard to do with eyes filled with tears – I am with you on all that testy sentimentality!!! Now you have me inspired to pull out the Halloween decorations!!
Gosh I cant type today. – teary not testy!!!
Beautiful! It helps that all your photos are so well composed! Thanks for the lovely idea!
Feel very cool today: I just pinned you:)
That is adorable and a great idea. I think I need to add this to my ever-growing "To Do" list. Thanks for the inspiration!
Thanks for sharing! I was going to try to start decorating today and this will be my start. My kids will love it. Thanks again. You have great ideas. Trina
Love your photo garland, Sarah. Thanks for the Picasa info too ~ I use Picasa but haven't tried out any of the new features yet. A while back, one of my Andrew's friends (14 yrs old) squeezed into an old Winnie-the-Pooh costume of ours ~ so, so funny! The picture of Andrew is hillarious!!
I usually feel a little bit bah-hum-bug about Halloween. I don't like the decorations in the stores, etc. BUT–this is an idea I could get into. Thanks for sharing.
Best wishes with your new baby!
This looks fantastic! Such a fun idea. I have to ask where you got the paper lantern over the table! It's hilarious!
I love this idea! I'm going to try it.
LOVE this. You are so creative!
What a fun idea! I want to try it. Thanks for the tips. π
Super cute, thx for the idea!
I love this!!!
This is so clever and SO fun!!
My family is quite young and we have only celebrated 3 Halloweens. But I have been looking for the perfect solution to hanging our seasonal photos up and this is it! I think I will start on one for our Christmas photos. Plus it is a great excuse to use those fun photoshop actions.
Thank you for the inspiration! I just d/l Picasa3 and am so impressed at how easy this is (compared to a different software that I normally use). SO GREAT!
I love this! I was teary eyed just looking at YOUR pics on this blog! What a fantastic idea that I may copy! If only I can think of a good place for garland in my house! Thank you so much for sharing. : )
LOVE that.
this is my favorite idea for halloween garland ever!
What an awesome idea!! I be the kids love looking at all of these fun photos!! hugs, cathy
I love this idea and tried it on picasa last night. I added the white border and sent the photos to CVS to print. When I picked them up, the white border wasn't added. I was bummed and am not sure where I went wrong. Any advice? Thanks!
It think it is CVS's fault-maybe there was an option on their site when you sent them over to print a full picture or one with a border? I would call and ask them. Good luck!