Family Travels Map

     This is probably one of my favorite projects I've ever done.  My husband travels a lot for work and the kids and I often get to go along.  We also love our summer trips to go see family (most who live far away.)  I needed a fun way to display all our fun photos to remind us of all the great times we've had.  I came up with this idea after being inspired by a travel map I saw in one of those airplane catalogs (you know, the one with a million gadgets that you don't need and at costs you shouldn't pay?!)

     We keep track of where we've been by gluing on little, red rhinestones on the cities we've visited.

Around the map, we have room to display photos of our trips.  With all those trips, we end up with a lot of leftover coins.  I glued coins from all over the world to magnets and used these to hang up the photos. I LOVE how it looks!

Here's how I made this project:

I started with a HUGE frame I found for $5 at a garage sale.  It had just about the ugliest picture of a teddy bear I've ever seen in it.  But I saw the size and shape of the frame and grabbed it.  This barely fit in the back of my minivan, it's so big.  First, I painted the frame black.  I then cut a piece of very thin plywood to the size of the old backing. I then used liquid nails to glue a couple pieces of tin to the backing. I get sheets of tin at Home Depot in the Heating Duct section for about $9 for a 24" x 36" piece. You can use tin snips to cut the tin to size.
     After the glue dried, I used Mod Podge to apply scrapbook paper all over the tin.  I ordered the National Geographic world map from www.art.com (or www.allposters.com.)  I cut out just the map and used Mod Podge again to stick it over the scapbook paper. 

     I made a label in the center of the map, at the bottom.

Then, with your coin magnets, add your photos as you travel!

I included this picture of my little "tater tot" (and his cardboard "car tunnel") to show you the scale of this big map.  It's in our hallway so we can see it all the time.  When Daddy travels, I show them where he is.

     If you don't travel much internationally, use a large map of the US and do the same thing!  I'm looking to make another one soon, so I'll try to take photos of the process and post a better tutorial in the future.