DIY Dry Erase Calendar and Weekly Menu

I'll admit it. I LOVE Pinterest. I'm on there every day, getting craft inspiration, looking for decorating ideas, etc.  I am also constantly looking for functional yet cute things for the home...and I really wanted a dry erase calendar. What I didn't want was one of those white monstrosities that never looks good no matter how you try or where you put it. That's when I found This Tutorial on Pinterest and fell in love.

A couple of notes on this:

• if you don't have a printer that can print on 11"X17" paper, no worries. I used regular 8.5"X11" and just made sure that when I created my Excel spreadsheet all of the columns added up to 17" and my rows added up to be 11". It ends up being 4 sheets of paper that you cut and tape together. HERE is my calendar...feel free to print it out. It will save you time. Oh, and HERE is the notes page. 
• Do NOT cut off all edges of your calendar. Only the very bottom edge and the left side. That way you have extra paper on the top and right side to attach other papers to. Same goes for the notes page, but on that one I would only cut off the right edge...leave the rest.
• I didn't put anything on the back of my creation once it was all together. I left the backing that came in the frame separate, that way should I ever want to change the look of the calendar, I have a sizing reference.
• Leave room for overlap on ALL of your pieces...that way they can be taped/glued together
• You can get free photoshop graphics to create your shapes, and if you make a new file in photoshop with a transparent background and save it for the web, you can put it on word, resize as needed, and print onto whatever paper you would like.

This one took me about 2 hours total, and that's only because it took me a few tries to get the sizing of the calendar right. Plus I'm really indecisive about fabric and/or paper combos, so I second-guessed myself a lot. Actual construction time was probably about 20 minutes, but you have to add in measuring and cutting, not to mention designing the different elements.

I also found a weekly dry erase menu on Pinterest. You can find that tutorial HERE. 

Here are my notes on that one:

• I chose not to use canvas, but to line up 2 pieces of scrapbooking paper (cut to size)
• I also put my ribbon in a different place, because I wanted to hide the seam of the paper. :)

This one only took me about 15 minutes to do...and maybe now I stand a chance of NOT hearing "What's for Dinner" every day!