I didn't keep my receipts from this project but the whole thing (including materials I didn't end up using because of a mess up) cost about $30.
- Background Board. Make sure it is large enough to fit 12 small dowels for each month and whatever text you want to put on it. Make sure it is small enough to put wherever you want to put it.
- Text. I couldn't find letters in the exact size I wanted so I also bought round dowels to put behind the text.
- Month and Day Dowels. Make sure you have enough to have one for each month (Jan - Dec) and one for each birthday plus extras for an expanding family. This is where my mess up happened but I'll get into that in a little more detail later.
- Hooks and Eyes. Really you can attach you birthdays anyway you want but I wanted to use hooks and eyes so it would be easy to add new birthdays. Make sure to get enough hooks for every month and day dowel and enough eyes for just the day dowels.
- Paint. You'll need paint for the background board, the text on the background board, and the dowels but you'll also need a paint pen to add names and birthdays to the day dowels.
- Paint Brushes. I had three but wished I had more because the paint dried faster on the dowels that the paint brushed dried after being cleaned.
- Hot Glue and Hot Glue Gun. If there is a better way to attach everything to the board, by all means use that.
- Hanger. I don't remember what this is really called but you'll need a thing to put on the back of the board so it can be hung on a wall. I have a picture of one later on if I'm not being clear here.
Steps
1. Paint everything that needs painting.
2. (Optional) Glue text onto background dowels.
3. Glue text/background dowels on to background board. In the picture this looks really pretty with it being centered and all but the truth is, I wish I had glued them just a little higher on the Birthday Board. From the first picture in the post you can see that the month dowels are really close to the text. If I had glued the text higher, their wouldn't be so much empty space at the top of the Birthday Board and the whole thing would just look better.
Here are my side steps because of how I messed up. The month and day dowels that I bought weren't thick enough for the hooks and eyes that I bought. Dad was going to help me drill holes in the dowels for the hooks and eyes but we kept breaking the dowels. So we went to the hardware store, bought some MDF and a hole saw (Dad had been looking for an excuse to buy one) and we cut out the dowels ourselves. The side steps are for that process.
S1. Cut out dowels using the hole saw. Make sure the saw is set up in a way that you won't be getting a hole in the middle of your dowel.
S2. The dowel won't be perfect, so sand off any awkward edges.
S3. Paint (see Step 1). Painting these wider dowels was much easier than the thin ones because I didn't have to worry about getting paint everywhere.
Now back to the regular steps.
4. Make a hole in the dowel in which to put the hooks and eyes. Because my dowels were made from MDF, I could just use a push pin to make the holes. If your dowels are made of something a little thicker, you may want to use a drill. Remember that you month dowels only need one hole.
5. Screw in hooks and eyes. I used pliers (CJ's idea) to help screw in the hooks and eyes, it really ended up being easy after step 4.
6. Use the paint pen to add names and days to the day dowels and the months to the month dowels.
7. Screw the hook to the back of the board. I also glued it on there, just to be safe.
Now, once all the days are hooked in the right order, you have a Birthday Board.
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