Keeping Time

I saw this super cute (I think) idea of a wall of clocks and saved the picture for inspiration. I can't remember where the picture came from (sorry!) so if you know, leave a comment and I'll give credit.
I thought a wall of clocks sounded like a really fun idea for our loft. My husband took some convincing, but I was successful! Then, I had to find a clock that I liked that I could afford to buy several of... Have you looked at the price of clocks? A nice one can run you $20 and times 6 to 9? I just couldn't afford that! I'd given up and was just going to make my own. I figured out that the least expensive way to get clockworks was to buy the cheap clocks at Walmart/Target and take the clock part out. When I went to pick up my son's school supplies, I wandered through the clock section of Walmart just to get an idea for what types of clock hands I could find and I found the perfect clocks and they were only $5! I didn't get them. Partly because I'd already started collecting supplies (like clock faces) for my clocks and partly because I wasn't sure what my husband would say if I brought all the clocks home all at once. And I wanted 9, but had decided I would just do 6 because clocks are pricey but now I wanted 9 again. I went back the next day after telling my hubby the great news. :) I actually had to order a few online to get all the colors in the quantity I wanted.

So, here's my wall of clocks!

I wanted to do locations around the world that had some significance with our family. Many of our siblings and myself and my husband all served missions for our church and we served all over the world. My sister also did a school year abroad in high school and one of my brothers currently lives in China, so I did those too for more around the world variety (3 of my brothers served in South America and I didn't want the locations that concentrated.) Currently, we have where we live up on the wall too, but I want to get another clock for the loft with the local time. (I seriously love clocks!) My husband's youngest brother is planning on serving a mission soon and we'll be replacing Tucson with his mission when the time comes. That way we can tell our boys, this is where your uncle is right now and this is the time! Fun, fun!

We also decided that it would be neat for the kids to see on a map where everyone served missions and/or lived. The boys love the map and Son #2 is constantly asking me "which country is that one?" Son #1 and #2 were telling me where they were going to go on their missions yesterday as I was putting up all the vinyl.

I added to the right side of each clock the difference in time from here to there. That way we can tell if it's afternoon, morning or even the next day whenever we want to. I also added the specific names of the missions under each clock. I picked up the map from Amazon. It had the best colors for our room. The coolest thing is all but one of our clock locations is on the map! Including where we live. The frame came from Walmart and we hung it at kid eye level.

I love how my wall turned out. It covers our tall wall nicely and looks great. Plus, the colors in the clocks and map coordinate really well with our loft. The only down side is with 9 cheap clocks all together, they are pretty loud. I don't mind that much (my kids are louder!) but my husband said he feels sorry for anyone wanting to sleep in our loft!

Stay tuned, tomorrow I'll show my finished loft! Well, finished so far anyway... :)