Family Tree - Simplified

Back in November ('cause that's how long ideas can sit around here before they're tackled) I came across a Hand-Lettered Family Tree on MarthaStewart.com and thought it was a very simple, attractive and easy-to-create family tree. It also makes a very inexpensive, thoughtful and personal gift. I planned to make one for my new nephew that is due in the Spring.

Hand-Lettered Family Tree on MarthaStewart.com 

After several layout sketches and a couple of botched attempts at the hand lettered family tree, I put the project aside for awhile. I was going through WAY too much paper for this "simple" tree. It was very hard spacing names that had to be written on the left-hand side of the tree. The letters had to be written in backwards order to get them spaced correctly. And then they just looked bad.

Then I found another family tree made in MS Office using WordArt. I made a few changes, still trying to keep to the original plan (simple tree) as much as possible.

I hated the resulting tree. Too simple. Too plain. Too UGLY! Not to mention the paper warped when I glued it.  So once again, the project was put aside.

Then I ran across a new blog, A Little Hut. While skimming through her posts and multiple crafts, I came across a tutorial for an Autumn Tree Gift Tag. I watched the video and knew I had my family tree. I took the gift tag idea and enlarged it creating a 12" x 12" family tree.

The tree is cut from card stock and the backing is also card stock. The colored paper scraps are just that - scraps of paper I had in my stash.

When drawing out the tree, I made sure I had enough branches for people's names and couple's wedding dates and wrote them all in with a fine point sharpie.

The whole thing slid easily into an inexpensive 12" x 12" frame. I found this one at Michael's for $6.99.

The result...perfect. Not what I originally had in mind, but I think I might like this one better. And to think it was inspired by a gift tag...which I also made to go with the gift.