Some cheap (and green!) wall art

I buy an Ansel Adams calendar every year (after Christmas, of course, when they’re 50% off!) and this past Christmas, as I was getting ready to recycle the calendar, it occurred to me that it’s kind of a shame to throw away these lovely black and white pictures, which are on nice, heavy duty paper.

So, I dug up an old black photo frame, dusted it off, cropped the calendar picture to fit, and voila! I have a nice framed black and white picture.

The frame is actually a total cheapie, but it came with the mat, and I think the mat makes a huge difference. If you don’t happen to have a frame sitting around, they can be had cheaply at a place like Michael’s or A.C. Moore. They go on sale for 40% on a regular basis, but you can always use one of the 40% coupons from the ad if you don’t catch them on sale.

I put the frame on an empty wall above a table that I got from freecycle (I painted it, of course, and you can see before and after photos here.)

While I adore black and white pictures, I didn’t think I really needed twelve of them on my walls. Rather than throw them in the recycling bin, I posted the picture of my framed photo on freecycle as an example and offered up the rest of the calendar. I divided them up between two people, and so to the best of my knowledge, nothing but the wire from my calendar has gotten thrown away.

By the way, the picture below is what that area used to look like. When we moved in, there was a low drop ceiling there, carpet, a little skinny opening to that area, and no door on the laundry room. With the help of my dear dad and brother, we framed and drywalled the area, added a pocket door, installed recessed lighting, and tiled the floor. It’s still sort of a weird, hard-to-use area in our house, but it is SO much better than it used to be.