Inspiration Block

My elementary school art teacher, Mrs. Wolf, taught me a valuable lesson that I'm still using today!  "Work with your mistakes!", she would say to us.  You see, there was never starting over in her class.  You got only one sheet a paper to work with so if you 'messed up' that was too bad.  You worked with it!

Well, we recently took a trip to Arches National Park with our kids.  It was BEAUTIFUL and I took tons of pictures.  Of course a lot of them didn't turn out but I'm not a professional photographer so I expected that.

While at Double Arch I took some photos of my son standing in one of the arches.  It was back lit because we were there in the late afternoon and while taking the photo's I thought, "why am I taking these?  None of them are going to turn out".  I kept snapping photos of course.  That's the joy of digital photography, right?

Here's what the photos looked like. What am I going to do with that, right?

Well, while looking through our vacation photos an idea popped into me head.  Why not add a quote in the big white area and act like I took the photo that way on purpose?  Work with my mistake!!

So that's what I did.  Now my son has a really cool 'Inspiration Block' to put in his room and a fun memory of climbing Double Arch on our vacation!

All I did was import the picture into Picasa, add the text, and print it out.  Use whatever quote you want and whatever font you like.  Picasa is super easy to use so just play around until you find what you like.

Here are the wood pieces I used.  I got them at a local hardware store.  Just paint the pieces of wood.  I also distressed the edges with an ink pad.  Mod Podge the photo on the block and then glue all the pieces together.  It's that easy!

Here's the end product!  Can you find my son in the photo? 

So the next time you make a mistake just remember my art teachers words, "Work with your mistakes" and see what you come up with!!