happy day

there is a new project brewing in the stephens home this week...making our own photo mats.

this came about when my husband (recently dabbling in photography because of his new nikon D3000) took some beautiful photos of a few landmarks of downtown memphis. he wanted to mat and frame them for our apt. and discovered that photo mats are not only expensive but hard to find in certain sizes. it was my suggestion that he buy his own mat cutter with his christmas money and make his own; his mind went from there. he stayed up late that night browsing the web for what he thought would be the best instruction for diy mat making. he came upon this blog and settled here for his tutorial.

the next day we purchased all the necessary supplies for mat making which, most importantly, included the mat cutter. this is a hand held mat cutter that you push up against a long ruler to get a straight line, and we went with this one because it was the least expensive and we thought "how hard can it be as long as you have a sturdy straight edge?" answer: VERY HARD! i thought the mat cutter was going to be hurled through a window or at my head. after using an entire 32x40 inch sheet of mat board "practicing" and not having a single mat that we would actually use and several hours of shouting at inanimate objects, we surrendered.

puzzled and flustered

today, we returned the original mat cutter and coughed up the extra change for one that is on a track (virtually dummy proof) for the sake of our marriage. it was actually a great price at the art center, and now the hubs is a matting genius. our minds can now be at ease.

yay for new mat cutter

before (1st mat cutter)

after (2nd mat cutter)

please note: these mats are not cut in a trapezoid shape, that is just how i took the picture. i promise they are real rectangles!