Make Your Own Travel Memories Shadow Box

This post contains affiliate links

My family and I are so blessed to live on the beautiful emerald shores of the Gulf Coast. I don’t think I’ve ever been to the beach and not come home with at least a few beautiful sea shells. It’s the most popular thing to collect on any beach, right? If you’re in other parts of the world, you may be so lucky to find sea glass, colorful stones, and other fun treasures. I’ve wanted to make a shadow box for all our beach mementos for a while now. I’ve had a shadow box in my craft stash forever, and now that it’s summer beach season, it’s the perfect time.

This shadow box project is a great way to display and store your own travel memories. No matter what your destination, there’s always some little something you could save and display in your shadow box. And this one is super easy to make, and you can completely customize it however you’d like, in whatever colors and decor style suits you.

IT’S TIME FOR A MONTHLY CRAFT DE-STASH, HOSTED BY C’MON GET CRAFTY!

Every month, a group of bloggers challenge each other to create a new craft or project from their own stash of goodies! Check out some awesome creations you might be able to make from your own stash!

How does the Craft Room Destash Challenge work, exactly?  Well, participants can create something – anything – using primarily items within their own “stash”. They’re allowed up to $10 for necessary supplies (i.e. paintbushes, glue, ribbon, etc.) but that’s it!

If you’d like to join in the Craft Room De-Stash Challenge, you can request to join our Facebook group here.

I’ll say, I’ve done pretty well so far this year and haven’t had to spend too much of my $10 budget for my projects. This month, I didn’t spend any money out of pocket to create my travel memories shadow box, I’ve had these supplies all stashed away waiting for a rainy day. And considering it’s rained here in Florida from day one of the kids Summer Vacation, it’s a miracle I even had a minute to spare to craft anything, ha! These rainy days mean kids inside all day…

But I digress. Let’s get right into the project, shall we?

How to Make Your Own Travel Memories Shadow Box

Supplies:

• Unfinished wood shadowbox
• Paint or Wood stain
• Decorative scrapbook paper
• Mod Podge
• Image of your travel destination (just Google a clip art of whatever state or location you’ve visited)

Tools:

• Paintbrush
• Rags or Foam brush if you use wood stain
• Mineral spirits if you use wood stain
• Scissors
• Carbon paper for tracing

Before you begin, chose your color palette. You should also decide if you’re going to paint or stain, or do like I did, and use a combo of both.

Make sure you find a shadow box that has a removable back. Most of them do, but this is important to be able to customize your box, as well as to add your treasures as you find them.

First, I painted the inside of the box, as well as the back. I thought I was going to leave the back white, but I decided later to add more color.

Next, I stained the outside of the box. I just rubbed it on with a rag. I used my General Finishes gel stain in java, left over from some of my furniture makeover projects.

You’ll want to use gloves with the stain, and mineral spirits for easy clean up.

Chose an image you want as a memory of your trip. Maybe that’s a state you visited, a city skyline, a favorite Disney character. Whatever reminds you of your trip, it’s easy to just Google an image to trace for the back of your box.

After you print your image to size, use the carbon paper to trace it onto your scrapbook paper.

When your image is ready, cut it out.

I said earlier that I decided I didn’t want my background to be white. So, I chose a complimentary color scrapbook paper, and traced the back of the box onto it and cut it out as well.

The last step is to Mod Podge your papers onto the back of your shadow box.

I found this small bottle of Mod Podge at my local Dollar Tree, but if you don’t have one of those close by, it’s available on DollarTree.com as well.

I love the multiple colors in my Florida shadow box.

Just as I thought, the shells pop against the vibrant background.

I know the bright colors aren’t for everyone. The sky is the limit for customizing your own shadow box.

These would make great gifts, travel memories, and several displayed together would make an awesome gallery wall design.

What would you display in your own shadow box?

What style would yours be customized to?

If you like this project and would like to see more from my previous Craft Room Destash ideas, you can check them all out HERE.

And, be sure to check out all the other creative bloggers and their destash projects for the month!

SaveSave

SaveSave