DIY - Huge, Dry Erase Calendar Board

A huge dry erase calendar is not only good to keep track of important deadlines, meetings, or appointments in your home or office, but this one also doubles as wall art!

My weekend was spent right here, in this empty office you see in the picture below. My task: furnishing and styling that empty space, one single project at a time.

I should've been demolishing and updating my master bathroom, but what do you do when your kid asks for help?

Yup. You run as fast as you can to their rescue!

She needed big help transforming this yellow box into a space she could call the office.

Ugh, I wanted to get rid of that yellow on the walls, but I guess they rented this space because yellow is one of the colors of the campaign, and besides it's a rented space, so no damage to the walls was allowed.

This is the view when standing at the entrance door:

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And here, in the opposite direction, from the back of the office all the way to the entrance door:

And yeah, that's my daughter. :)

I took notes and measurements and set to work on building a few desks, a shelf, and some other décor projects for the walls, like the project I'm sharing with you today:

A HUGE Dry Erase Calendar Board

for this wall:

I could've grabbed a big panel board and hung it there on the wall, but it would've been more difficult to transport and hang without damaging the wall.

The big panel board I bought was cut into pieces to create the calendar. I used tape in between boards to protect the wall and for good-looking line divisions. Gaffers tape is my favorite and it always cleanly gets off the wall. 

But, let me show you how you can replicate this look for around $60 if you use only one board:

The materials you'll need for an 8' x 4' calendar: 

• 1 (8'x4') Thrifty white panel board - cut lengthwise at 12" (you'll get four lengths)
• Black Gaffers tape
• Command Picture Hanging Strips

Tools:

• BOSCH Self-Leveling Cross-Line Laser - Not a necessity, but it will make this job much easier to accomplish, otherwise a level.
• Miter saw will be the easiest way to cut the board lengths, but you can also use a circular saw, jigsaw or even a hand saw.

Directions:

THE BOARDS

As I said before, buy the thrifty white panel board at the Home Depot and ask to be cut, lengthwise, at 12".

They make the cuts for you, but those cuts are not precise. Some of my boards were wider than others.
Have in mind that the blade also eats a good amount of the board.  The thing is, you don't need precision for this project.

At home, cut each of the planks at 12" intervals, getting 8 squares out of each plank for a total of 36 squares.  You'll only need 35 to have a board similar to the one I created. But, as with any DIY project you can set the dimensions to fit your own space

I bought two 8' x 4' boards, thinking of using some of the squares on other projects around the office. Each of my squares was a bit longer 13" x 12"

SETTING THE HORIZONTAL LINES

BOSCH Self-Leveling Cross-Line Laser

The self-leveling cross-line laser was the main tool for this project.

I didn't measure anything on that wall! I eye-balled how high I wanted the first board on the wall and set the laser line on that mark. Notice that I also placed seven boards on the floor, against the wall, trying to determine the length.

Then, the gaffer tape was attached to the wall, alongside the laser line.

One of the boards was placed mid-way through the gaffer's tape, to mark the next line position. (above picture).

It was right there at that point that I decided to divide the chunky tape into two, less wasting of materials and sleeker lines. (picture below)

Gaffers tape is the one tape I keep on using constantly. It sticks so well to the wall and it doesn't damage it! 👍 Have in mind that recently painted surfaces can be affected.

The same pattern continued five more times... Grabbing a board to mark the next line, set the laser, and stick the tape along the laser line.

Before starting with the vertical lines, pieces of double-sided tape were fastened to the four corners of the boards.

I used this double-sided tape after reading some good reviews about it on amazon, but it didn't work for this application. See the note below on this post.

SETTING THE VERTICAL LINES

Once again, gaffer tape was used here on the vertical, since it was a really long wall, I didn't cut the tape in two, those lines are chunkier than the horizontal ones.

After setting the initial line, the process was the same... Grab a board to mark the next line, set the laser, and stick the tape along the laser line.

A little piece of tape at the very top was my mark to set the laser line.

Getting the pieces of paper off the tape was what took the longest!
Each board was pressed really hard against the wall to set it in place.

When it was too hard to see the laser lines, I turned the lights off, and whoa, much easier. ;)

And finally, the last board!

I didn't have the numbers or letters yet. So, I called it a day and went home.

BIG TROUBLE

However, my daughter called me like an hour later to tell me all those boards were FALLING OFF THE WALL!! She was so embarrassed because her boss had arrived and they were there busy working on something important and "those stupid boards kept on falling!". 😡


THE SOLUTION:

Well, Command strips to the rescue!  I bought two of these value packs for this project, and if you use only one board, one package might be enough. I bought two because there were many other things I needed to hang on those walls without damaging them.

These command strips are the way to go, they're like Velcro. You put together two strips, Velcro side together, peel off the paper on one side and stick it to the small board... Repeat with as many strips you want to secure to that board.
I used three strips on each board, I think it was a bit overboard because the boards don't weigh more than a pound. At first, I only used two, but the boards were swinging a bit when pressed to the wall. I didn't like that movement since they're going to be used for writing. So, three strips were secured on most of them.

UPDATE:  Be sure to place the two of three Command strips in the same spot in every single square. That way is going to be easy to update the calendar each month.  I thought that moving the sicker numbers was going to be easy, but nope. It was hard to peel off the numbers and then, make them look straight.  The Command strips work like Velcro, pull off the entire board, and bring it to the new position for the following month.

The pack of hanging strips was the item that brought the cost of this project a bit higher, the price for each box was $30 but now I saw it at only $25.

| Command™ Picture Hanging Strips, White, Pack Of 50 |

THE NUMBERS & DAYS OF THE WEEK

Once all the boards were re-attached with Command Strips, it was time to add the numbers and the days of the week.

I used my Silhouette Cameo to cut the black vinyl numbers and letters. However, this is another step you can skip by simply writing them down with a marker. You can also use stickers sold at the craft store.

IS IT DRY-ERASE PROOF?

This entire panel board isn't a real dry-erase board, but it works pretty well.
The following picture is a sample of writing on it with a dry erase marker and erasing it.

Writing and erasing on a board without wax on it.

There's a little bit of ghosting that doesn't bother me at all.

But, you can use a rag and wax to prevent that ghosting. I wiped the boards with wax to create a smoother finish where the marker would be much easier to wipe off.

This is the marker and eraser set they're using:

| EXPO Dry Erase Set |

And well, this is how it looks now:

It fills that big wall so nicely and the divisions give it a little bit of texture.

I LOVE this project!

And I'm so happy to report they haven't fallen off the wall any longer. :D  Those Command strips rock!! 💓

Stay tuned for the other DIY projects done in this office, they worked really nice and hey, everything was done in a very tight budget and using supplies I had on hand.

UPDATE:

Here are the others projects completed in this office makeover:

• DIY - Simple office desk
• DIY - Simple office shelf
• Office reveal

Thanks for stopping by! And let me know if you make your very own. ;)

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