CRAFTY GRADUATION GIFT {tutorial diy}

My sister recently graduated from BYU-I with her B.A. in English. The timing of her internship and the start of her master's program are such that she won't have an opportunity to walk across the stage when her name is called. No graduation cap, no hand shaking with university dignitaries, and no smiling photographs with family members. Poor Becca, right?

But graduating is kind of a big deal. Something to celebrate--something to be really proud of!
Being the wonderful sister that I am, I couldn't stand for this important event to slip by unrecognized.
So I made her a present--a special, personalized gift to commemorate all that she has accomplished, and all that she has yet to accomplish in that bright future of hers.

I bought the fattest letters I could find (greater surface area for maps) and painted just along the edges. The rest I would be covering up, anyway.

Then I pulled out my scissors and thrift store atlas and went to town! Our spare bedroom was--and still is--a wreck.
The hardest part of this project was cutting and piecing it all to fit properly on the wood letters.

I originally got my idea from HERE, but I wanted to make this more personalized.
So I included bits and pieces of everywhere she's lived or vacationed to that might mean something to her: Gilbert, Mesa, Flagstaff, Provo, Orem, California, Nauvoo,Washington D.C., Mt. Rushmore, Rocky Point in Mexico...

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...and many, many more. This girl has been busy!
I visually separated each destination with super thin, white strips of paper, and cut the Eiffel tower image from a vintage map of Europe I bought for $1.00.

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Then I decoupaged over everything several times, and it was ready to hang on a wall or display on a book shelf.

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Then, almost by accident, I came across THIS free printable that was a perfect fit in every way: Becca loves to read, the "knowing" and "learning" matched the occasion of graduation, the colors matched, and it even used the word "GO" in capital letters.

Divine intervention, I'm tellin' ya! I never could have come up with anything better myself.

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I printed it out on photo paper, mounted it on scrapbook paper, hole punched the corner, and tied everything together with raffia.

A picture perfect graduation gift that I even got to hand deliver when we visited her in New York last week!

And she loved it.