Happy Birthday Sign

So here’s the deal. There’s a typo in this Happy Birthday sign. And I’m cheap and lazy and didn’t want to go back to the print shop to have them reprint it. Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, isn’t this DIY birthday banner SO cute! I made this for my son’s birthday and put it up after he went to bed the night before his special day. It was a fun surprise for him on his birthday and I know your kids will love it too! I like to look for little ways to make celebrations a little more fun. I knew a giant birthday card would be unusual and exciting, but I also wanted to make sure it was easy. Since I am not a graphic designer, I took a photo of my son against a blank wall so I didn’t have to worry about trying to cut out a busy background. I did this just a few days ahead of his birthday and made up an excuse as to why I needed the photo. To add the text, I used a program called Illustrator. But you could also use a free program like Canva or even Word. Just make sure you set up the document to match the finished size you want. When I was done with the wording, I saved the file to a thumb drive and took it to my local Kinko’s/Fed Ex store. Printing can be expensive but to keep costs down, have them print out a blueprint copy. This size is 4′ x 3′ and cost $9. They printed out some smaller sized ones for me as well (I think the 3′ x 2′ option was only $4 and still perfectly large enough to hang on a wall.) The rest of the family signed the Happy Birthday sign and then I used decorative masking tape to hang it on the wall. I found a super cute paper garland at Target to frame it with and add some color. This is not the birthday boy. But as you can see, we were all pretty excited about this wall card. My son loved it!! But really who wouldn’t love seeing their face this large on a wall in their house? ;) This Happy Birthday sign idea doesn’t have to just be for birthdays. It would also be a really great way to acknowledge a big accomplishment for a kid, like a great grade on a test.