Ancestor Wall

I had a vision for an Ancestor wall. I thought I wanted it like a wall gallery with lots of random frames, different sizes, shapes and colors.

So I got to work collecting frames. I hit up our local thrift store and the most I spent on a single frame was 2.99. Most of them were one dollar. I had a few of them here around the house too. I chose three colors of spray paint, Lydia helped me wash all the glass and we had fun making these old tattered frames look new again.

Mom had sent me lots of pictures from her Genealogy binders at home and Tyson's Aunt mailed me a few also.

When I got closer to hanging up all of these frames I realized I didn't truly want to hammer 30 holes into our brand new walls of our brand new homes. Instead I decided to go with shelves. But I didn't shelves that were sturdy, long and had a lip on the front so the photos wouldn't fall off.

I couldn't find what I was looking for anywhere. I tried Amazon, Ikea, Lowes, Hobby Lobby....etc. Nothing was matching my vision. So instead I thought why not make some shelves. I found a few tutorials on-line, showed them to Tyson and bada bing bada boom he went to work building shelves for our project.




It took him longer to read the instructions to the saw then it did to make the shelves. They turned out really great. I stained them with a two coats, let them dry for a few days and then we went to work hanging them up.

We decided the best wall was over our new piano. And I think we chose correctly. I also like that the piano gives me one more surface to display even more pictures. 

We all spend time at the piano, Lydia is here daily and I like that she has these people she loves and those who have gone before her with her as she plays. 

A few weeks prior to our project I was asked to teach Relief Society and since I was unpacking anyways I just loaded everything up and made a nice display. I brought a photo quilt I had made for my Grandma Woolf, my Grandma Selmans temple suitcase, my Grandma Selmans old rotary phone and the book A Christmas Dress for Ellen. I taught from a nice talk by President Eyring about Family History and it definitely inspired me to do more.