Scrapbook Headboard

Okay, I know it's not totally original and you can find a million different ways to do a headboard on Pinterest, but I've been trying to decide how I wanted to go about making an inexpensive one to change up our room. Initially I was going to cover plywood or foam board in fabric. But like many of my plans, that changed.

 

I found foam board when I was at the dollar store, for you guessed it, $1 a piece. I bought six because I wasn't sure how big it would need to be and I bought it on a whim. When I was at Joann's I looked at fabric and decided it would be a little more expensive and I'd have to wait in the cutting line. So I explored the scrapbook paper aisle and found some really pretty paper (plus it was on sale 3 for 99 cents). I bought 40 pieces of paper (5 each of 8 different patterns).

I held the foam board above my bed when I got home and realized I'd only need four of the foam board pieces. I taped the four pieces together. I then tried different methods of gluing the pieces on.

First, I tried mod podge. This was my first time really using this so I didn't know what to expect. I learned it's not that great for bigger pieces of paper. They got too wet and had air bubbles when they dried, plus it made the foam board curl.

I had to pull off, and waste, two pieces of paper and try again; luckily I had more paper than I needed.

Second, I tried spray adhesive. This worked well enough but it was messy because of overspray and I needed to use it outdoors and seeing that I was working on this at 10 p.m. I didn't really want to keep running out in the dark. Also, the spray adhesive didn't allow me to position the papers easily.

I finally settled on the old tried and true glue stick. I know this doesn't always hold permanently so I may have to go back and fix it occasionally but it worked the best for what I had because it didn't curl the foam board and didn't leave air bubbles. I could also reposition the paper when I needed to. (It came in handy later because I could pull the paper off a little to hide the nails to hang up the board).

I glued down all of my pieces. I had to use an exacto knife to trim off a little of the side of the board because the paper didn't go right to the side. I used a black paint marker to paint the sides of the white foam board.

I hung the board up on my wall by using several small nails. The board isn't very heavy so you don't have to go crazy, but I wanted to make sure to secure each individual foam board so they didn't decide to let gravity take over.

Overall, I'm personally pretty pleased with the results. (Just wish my phone was taking better pictures). Of course, I'll have to see how it holds up.