It’s been a crazy couple of days, and I have several posts in the works, but I wanted to quickly pop in and share the details of Keith’s birthday. I was epecially excited to play with my new chalkboard, so I raced home after work and got ready to go!

Step 1: Season your chalkboard!

Maybe step one should have been removing the price tag

As I explained in my last post, take a piece of white chalk and holding it sideways, rub it over the entire board, like in the photo above. Then take a damp paper towel and wipe it off. Now you’re ready to begin!

Step 2: Sketch out your design.

You actually don’t have to do this step, but I’m not very artistic by nature. So I needed to practice how I wanted the letters to look. I use Google for images of the cake and balloons. You could also use different fonts in Word to see how different fonts look, but I just winged it.

I don’t have a picture of the next couple steps. Oops. Bear with me!

Step 3: I used a ruler and a level from Keith’s tool kit and made three lines across the board where I wanted the words to go. This just ensured that I wrote a straight line and not a crooked one

Step 4: Add your words, lightly first and then go back over them when you are satisfied with how they look, and add any extra flourishes or swirls

Step 5: Add the embellishments, in my case, the cake and balloons.

Step 6: Take a photograph and put it on Instagram!

Follow me! @gentelly

I had no idea he even knew what Instagram was, nevermind had an account and was following me! Thankfully, he didn’t see this until later that night

And for a closeup:

For my first attempt, I was pretty happy with how it came out! He was also impressed with my nifty sign The best part was that it only took me 15 minutes, so I could feasibly change this every couple of days if I wanted. I’ll be leaving it up for a week, and since we are having a party for him next Saturday I’ll be changing the sign for that.

He was pretty psyched about his gifts too — new golf wedge, a dart board for his new “man-cave”, a sweater from Banana Republic and new slippers. Yeah, he’s kind of an old man

Gunner even got into the birthday spirit!

He is the strangest dog I’ve ever met. He LOVES presents and always has to help us open presents whenever he can. After, he uses the wrapping paper to “hide” his toy and rips it to shreds. It keeps him entertained for hours!

Selfie Ready for dinner!

We’re excited for next weekend, I’m throwing him a Beer Tasting Birthday Bash which should be a lot of fun, especially since 50% of our house is in boxes The party was supposed to be a surprise, but I really suck at keeping secrets. Especially fun ones like this! Stay tuned!