Mother's Day Gift -$1!

Of course you know by now, gentle readers, that I make all my own gifts for all gift-giving events. My average cost for a gift is $8. When it comes to gifts for my side of the family this $8 budget has to include shipping since they live a distance away. Have you ever tired to mail a gift across the country for under $8? Not an easy feat.
Which means I have to be super creative, to find something I can make on the cheap (that doesn't look cheap!) and light enough to mail without breaking the bank.

So this, is my $1 (pre shipping cost) Mothers Day solution for my mom who is also the Grandmother of four.

Wall Art Mother's Day gift

I did this with a Scrabble board and tiles.  Since I don't have the game Scrabble and buying one would exceed my $8 spending limit I reached out to some friends to borrow one.  Luckily, I have some great friends, and in less than a day someone had dropped off the game for me. I simply set it up with the word "Grandmother" and the names of her four grandchildren.  Then I snapped a photo of it and the game was ready to be returned to my friends. 

I took the photo I had taken and uploaded it to picmonkey.com.  This is a free photo editing site that I simply love. However, I see a great value in paying the $33/year membership (indeed I am a member) and having unlimited access to all the tools, features and fun. **Since this site allows for unlimited photo uploads and edits I used to split the annual cost with a friend and share a login** I played around with some different features and colour combinations until I had the above as a result. I loved it!

Black's Photography is currently running a promotion on their 8x10 digital prints. Only $1 each! (Regular price $4.99- not over the top expensive, but would get close to pushing my $8 gift limit after taxes and shipping).  So I uploaded the digital image to their website for photo processing and within an hour it was ready for pick up. 

I know what you're thinking- how can you give a wall art gift that needs framing without a frame?! And you're right, you really can't do that.  But it also makes zero sense for me to ship a heavy, bulky and breakable item.  Instead I reached out to my sister who lives in the same city as my mom, and asked if she wanted to "go in" on the gift with me (since I had already put her kids names in the photo I was really hoping she would say yes, and she did!)  She liked the idea, and she was willing to buy the frame. So I just have to mail the photo to her - an additional cost of about $1- and her and I will have created a gift that I really believe my mom will treasure.