When my first niece was born, my family all lived fairly close to one another, so we saw each other often. But by the time Emmy was born, Brian and I were in Austria and her other aunt and uncle were half way across the U.S. So I wanted to make Emmy a gift with our photos. You know, so she'll know who we are.
I tried to get my family to send me photos of themselves, but I just got a lot of excuses. Maybe it's because I told them I wanted farm-themed photos. I did get photos of my nieces, which I decided to photoshop a bit. My favorite is the photo of Emmy riding a sheep.
This toy was easy to make and very well received. As soon as she opened it, Emmy started moving the magnets around laughing. When her mom asked if she wanted to open another present, Emmy said no. That's the sign of a good gift -- you don't need to open any more!
The project is pretty self-explanatory. I used a metal pencil case as the holder, but I think you can find empty metal cases of various sizes at craft stores. Of course, I couldn't find anything like that in Vienna, so I had to make do. I covered the case with a label I designed with a farmhouse and added the same image on the inside of the case. Next, I found the photos and printed them on magnet paper. I used Gimp to crop around the images and then added them to a Word document to print them. Since I was planning to cut out the magnets, I didn't waste a lot of time getting the crop just right. The animals are from a book I purchased, which I had planned to incorporate into the gift before I found the metal pencil case.
I had a lot of fun making the toy and it seems like Emmy really enjoyed receiving it. And hopefully now she'll recognize us when we see her later this year!
Edited March 4, 2009: Welcome Tip Junkie Readers! For more magnet toy inspiration, visit this post where I show off a personalized Disney Princess magnet set.
10 comments:
SO cool Alisha!!! What a great idea!
Thank! I forgot to mention in the post that I didn't come up with this idea on my own. I saw the personalized magnets somewhere online.
Love, love, love it! Hope you don't mind, but I linked to this on my current post. Can't wait to go over there and see it in person.
Emmy LOVES this "toy." She always picks out Uncle Brian and Aunt Alisha and then laughs and laughs. I think she knows how cool and funny her aunt and uncle are. I was mighty impressed with your handiwork.
That is quite impressive. I'm considering making one for my classroom with all of the kids in it. I think it would be a hit! Of course this will be done in my free time (which seems to be lacking) so who knows if it will ever actually get done.
I love this idea!! I will definitely have to steal it!
Alisha -that is such an awesome idea! How big is the pencil case you used? I officially became "Aunty Em" on 12/27 to my first niece (halfway across the world also)so would love to make something similar. You are so creative!
-Aunty Em
Looks like you're becoming famous with this one. It is a BIG hit. Emmy still loves it!
That is one amazing present. I think I want one. I even have an old pencil case....hmmm.......
Alisha, you rock the arts & crafts world. You really do!
This is a marvelous Idea, The kiddos(daycare kids) would love this with their pictures on it. I am going to get busy and start taking pictures this afternoon. I think I will see if the magnets will stick to some Cookie Sheets that I have that I don't use. It would give them a larger surface to play with on the table.
Thanks for the terrific idea
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