Thank you 😁

Thank you, Candra!

Thank you!

Thank you, Mrs. K!

Thank you, Debbie!

Thanks! It's difficult to remember back to the days when we actually had the free time to do that sort of thing.

Thank you, Amy! 😁

Thanks Brittani! If we've made at least one person cry, then we know it was all worth it! :-) Glad you enjoyed our video!

Thanks, Stephany! We had a great time painting it. It'll probably be our last big project for a while though. 😀

Thanks Yiqian! Glad to hear you found them helpful 😁

Thanks, Barry! I appreciate the kudos!

Thanks! That's actually a great suggestion. I originally wanted to paint a desert landscape with road leading to a huge black tunnel entrance going through one of the mountains, but my wife was worried our son would keep trying to enter the painted tunnel and smack his face against the wall.

Thank you 😁

большое тебе спасибо! 😁

Thank you, Chadene!

Obrigado pelas suas ​​palavras gentis!

Obrigado por suas palavras gentis!

Thanks Jessie! Glad it was helpful! Good luck on your stairwell project!

Thank you, Rita! 😁

Thank you! 😁

Thank you! 😁

Thank you!

co ka Thanks 😁

Thanks! It'll all be worth it when he's finally old enough to say to us, "Mom and Dad, mountains are nice, but I really wanted my room to be painted to look like outer space." 😀

Thanks! Sadly, the shades have since been retired.

Matt Bitzer i haven't tried mural painting..is it not possible to re-coat or redo it..sorry for the terms..haha

Thank you, Cheril! 😁 Good luck with your nursery!

Thank you, jama01! It was a fun project. We were pretty surprised when our finished product actually matched our initial plans for the room. Sometimes it can be a roll of the dice with these things.

what kind of paint you use?

jama01 We used Behr Marquee interior paint and primer. According to the Behr website it's both low VOC and Greenguard Gold Certified.

Thanks Matt!

Thank you for the kind words! We were thrilled that it turned out the way it did 😁

Thank you! It was a really fun project that turned out better than we expected.

Thanks Barry!

Me too! Glad you like it 😁

@@mattbitzer Matt..where do you live? I have never been in contact with foreigners.. I really like it in art and amaze with your work😊☺ 👍

Hello @@bungakuning9251 ! I'm glad you enjoyed our artwork. To answer your question: I live in the United States. It's nice to meet you. Thank you viewing our video and leaving such kind comments!

Thanks!

Thank you!

Thank you!

Thank you!

Congrats on your baby and what I can only assume is a magnificent nursery! I'm glad you enjoyed our video and happy to hear it gave you some inspiration for your own nursery. Your comment made my day! :-)

@@mattbitzer did you guys use a program to map it out like a grid? Are they 1ft x 1ft grids?

@@spiderman23s9 I just used Photoshop to map out the design, but you could really use any design program (there are some good free alternatives out there too). I'm sure there's probably a program out there that could map out this grid on any image for you, but I didn't really look for one. A quick Google search would likely uncover any options there, but I stuck with the manual method. First, I measured the dimensions of the wall. Let's say the dimensions of one of the walls were 13' wide by 10' tall. On my design program I'd create a "canvas" or document that matched those dimensions proportionally. So, perhaps my Photoshop canvas would be 2600px by 2000px. Then I added different mountain range silhouettes as layers on the canvas. I gave the mountain ranges different colors in order to separate the ranges in the foreground from those further in the background. Then, I arranged them they way I wanted on the canvas. As you suggested, I did create a 1ft x 1ft grid (as far as I can recall) of masking tape on the physical wall. Since my wall is 13' wide and I made my digital canvas 2600 pixels wide, I knew that 1 foot of wall space equals 200 pixels on my canvas (2600/13 = 200). Knowing that conversion, I could then just add straight black lines every 200 pixels across both the height and the width of the canvas. That gave me a grid on the digital canvas that was proportional to that of the grid on the wall (13 squares wide by 10 squares tall). Then, just like you used to do in those children's activity books, it's as simple as copying the design grid onto your wall grid one square at a time until the complete picture is formed. Repeat for every other wall that requires a design. Hope this helps!

@@mattbitzer thanks so much for the in depth reply. I have the Adobe Suite, but I'm more skilled in After Effects than PS. I'll have to watch some tutorials, thanks so much.

@@spiderman23s9 Happy to help! Good luck with your project.

Gracias, Gabrielle!

Woah, markstephens36! That sounds amazing! You clearly took that project to a whole other level that I can't even compete with. Very impressive. Are there any images of your work online available for the viewing public? If so, I'd love to see how the final project turned out.

Thanks, Tony! Good luck with your project!

Matt Bitzer we did it went amazing thanks to your video. We added a couple of viaducts with trains as it's for a two year old. But we couldn't have done it without this video :)

Good idea adding the viaducts! Two-year-olds sure do love their trains. Wish I could see the final presentation, but it sounds like it turned out pretty amazing. Glad our video gave you some ideas :-)

Thanks Jennifer!

Hey Ryan! Glad you enjoyed the project and congratulations on your baby! To sketch out the mountains we took somewhat of a hybrid freehand approach. If you head to the 4:45 mark on the video you'll see that we created a digital image of the mountain ranges we wanted to sketch on the wall. We used Photoshop to do this. I basically found several different silhouettes of mountain ranges on Google image search, dumped them into Photoshop, resized and flipped them to get the look I wanted, and then played with their orientation and overlapping until I got my desired look for the scene. This digital image shows a flattened view of all three walls that would contain mountains. Note that the total height and width is proportional to the actual walls we'd be painting, for consistency in transferring the image later on. You can see how we created a grid overlaying the digital image too. Once we created the digital image we needed to recreate that same grid overlay on the actual walls of the room. That was how we planned to transfer the design--one square of the grid at a time. We used masking tape to do this. At that point we had blank walls covered with a grid of making tape (see the 4:37 mark). We had to ensure that the grid on our walls was the same number of squares as what we had on our digital image. The idea was to focus on transferring the details of only one square at a time. We used a pencil to lightly sketch the mountain outlines one by one. I'm no artist, so this more engineering-type method allowed us to take a bite sized approach to transferring the design from the small screen to the life-size walls. Also, keep in mind that since the mountain shape isn't consistent, no one was going to notice any mistakes anyway, so we weren't too concerned if our grid transfer wasn't perfect. Did that clear things up? Let me know if I can offer more clarity or insight into our process. Good luck!

😁

Thank you, Tiffany! I'd love to paint another room like this, but after this kid was born I don't think we'll ever have this much free time again. :-)

Thank you, Eleanor! Congratulations on your baby and good luck with your room painting! Here are the answers to your questions: 1. My wife reminded me that we only used one gallon of the blue and one gallon of the yellow paint for the entire room. We also had another gallon of pure white paint for covering the ceiling, which isn't shown in the video. 2. The room was a different shade of yellow before we even considered making this the baby's room. The previous owners of our house had painted it some unknown shade of yellow. We preferred a more muted yellow and painted over the upper half of each wall that would ultimately become the yellow sky. We didn't worry about painting the lower half of the walls yellow since it would be covered by the blue mountains anyway. The fourth wall (that wasn't really shown in the video) used the most yellow paint since it was all sky and didn't have any mountains. It was just coincidence that the original color of the room was yellow. 3. We used little one-inch foam brushes for the edges of each mountain range. They allowed for greater control over the outline of the mountains than a standard bristle brush. Though, in general, we didn't concern ourselves with painting perfect mountains. We figured that even if we made a mistake it would look like just another jagged mountain range and no one would notice anyway. For the solid "inner section" of each mountain range color we did have a smaller, mini roller that allowed us to cover some of the larger inner-mountain areas. As I recall the mini roller was probably around 3 inches long and maybe about an inch or 1.5 inches in diameter. The small diameter of the roller allowed us to get into some of the tight areas where the mountain range narrowed. It was more precise than some of the bigger 2 or 3-inch diameter rollers. As you saw in the video, it worked best for us to start with the more "distant" mountain ranges and work our way to the closer ranges. That way, the closer ranges would allow us to paint over the bottom edges of the more distant mountain ranges. We found that it was easier to paint over some of the mistakes we had made on the lower edges of the more distant mountains. Since the paint for the closer mountains was darker we could slightly overlap the previous mountain range without any issues for a crisper contrast between each range. Also, note that we did have to do a second coat for some of the lighter colored mountain ranges. It helped create a more solid, consistant color throughout the mountain range and eliminated any streaks of paint showing through from the layer below it. The darker mountains didn't really need it as much. Hope that helps!

Hi Mihir, congratulations to you and your wife! Such an exciting time! I'm happy our mural served as some good inspiration for your own nursery. Unfortunately, I do not have a blog post on the subject (nor is there there one planned anytime soon), though I have tried to give a good overview of the process in the video description. I also tried to be very detailed in my responses to those who commented on this video asking specific questions about paint colors, techniques, and other details. I would have loved to have done a blog post on this mural since I've had so many folks interested in how it was done, but time is unfortunately a little scarce these days, as is often the case with young kids. I know it's a bit tedious, but take a look through the comments and you may find answers to questions already asked (I know I reference the colors used at one point). Sorry I couldn't provide a more thorough walkthrough, but hopefully this gives you what you need to be ready by June.

Daryl Espenilla, you won't regret it! Almost two years later we're still loving the way it turned out!

Hi Allison, I'm glad to hear our video gave you some ideas for your own nursery! We were similarly inspired by some rooms that we had seen via a quick Google search. If you go to projectnursery.com/projects/olivers-woodland-nursery/ you'll see the room that we tried to emulate. If you squint really hard you might be able to see the similarities. To answer your question, the only colors we used were blue (Behr Inked M510-7 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M510-7) and yellow (Behr Frittata M290-2 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M290-2). The sky was just the straight Frittata yellow. The mountains were actually a series of mixtures of the Inked blue and the yellow Frittata. The closest mountain in the "foreground" was just solid Inked blue. The remaining four mountain ranges were a mixture of the blue and yellow. The closer mountain ranges were heavier on the blue and the more "distant" mountain ranges had a greater ratio of the yellow. It was a very inexact science trying to get the right mixture of blue and yellow for the five different mountain ranges. We basically got five cheap quart-sized paint buckets and experimented mixing the blue and yellow in order to get just enough contrast between each set of mountain ranges. Sometimes our buckets were too close in color, so we'd have to keep mixing in more paint to get the right colors. Before we even painted the five shades of blue/yellow on the wall we painted stripes of each color next to each other on a white piece of paper just to make sure the colors contrasted enough. As you can see from the video, we painted the sky first, then painted the lighted, most distant mountain range first, and worked our way into the darker mountains in the foreground. One word of warning: make sure when you create each blue/yellow mountain color mixture that you make enough of each batch to cover the desired area. If you run out of one of the mixtures it will be really difficult to recreate the exact ratio of colors and most likely your hue for batch number two will be ever-so-slightly off. Better to have more paint in each mixture than not enough. Hope that helps you! I'm happy to answer any other questions if you have them. Good luck!

Thanks for the kind words, Lucas! We are indeed happy and healthy, if not a little sleep deprived at times. To answer your question, the only colors we used were blue (Behr Inked M510-7 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M510-7) and yellow (Behr Frittata M290-2 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M290-2). The sky was just the straight Frittata yellow. The mountains were actually a series of mixtures of the Inked blue and the yellow Frittata. The closest mountain in the "foreground" was just solid Inked blue. The remaining four mountain ranges were a mixture of the blue and yellow.

Oh wow, I would have never guessed they were mixtures! Now I understand that shot of the paper with the cup measurements. Thanks again! Our daughter's coming in October and we hope to make her an adventurer, too!

Congratulations on your daughter! October will be here before you know it. Best of luck to you and your family! It's an exciting time!

Hey Matt! Quick question, how did you guys get the two furthest mountain ranges to be so light, almost fading into the yellow? I kept asking the yellow and it's still coming out too dark. Thanks :)

Lucas, my apologies! I walked through our paint mixing steps with my wife again this morning and she recalled that we ran into the same problem: the two furthest mountains were still too dark with only the blue and yellow paint combinations. She pointed out that we had added to the yellow-blue mixture some plain white paint that we used on the ceiling. That was how we got it to lighten up, and yes, I believe it was only used for those last two mountain ranges. Sorry for leaving out that crucial piece of data, but I had completely forgotten about that!

Hi Maggi! If you take a look at the 4:01 mark in the video, you can see the tree stamps we made next to two sheets of 8.5"x11" paper. The tallest of the five tree stamps was an inch or two shy of the full sheet of paper, so maybe about 9-10" tall. The smallest tree was about 6-7". The three remaining tree heights were distributed somewhere between those high and low ranges. We also varied the widths of each tree to give some variety to the foliage, as you can see at the 4:04 mark. The widths probably averaged around 5" or so. I'd give you exact measurements, but I'm writing this after the little guy fell asleep for the night; I figured these estimates would at least give you a good place to start. In the end, our goal was to create some variety in the trees without having such a stark and awkward contrast between the largest and the smallest tree. Each tree had some variation in the branches too, which helped avoid some of that cookie-cutter feel. Also, by positioning the tree trunk part of the stamp so it overlapped more of the mountain or less of the mountain, we were able to play with the tree heights even more. So, for example, when we used tree stamp #1, sometimes we would position the bottom edge of the trunk so it was pretty flush with the edge of the mountain silhouette. Other times we dropped tree stamp #1 lower so that it looked as though the tree didn't even have much of a trunk (the trunk actually overlapped the mountain itself). Hope that helps!

Thank you!

Hi Katherine! We used Behr Marquee interior paint and primer. According to the Behr website it's both low VOC and Greenguard Gold Certified. The paint itself had a very, very faint odor, so we felt pretty comfortable with my wife helping out. There was the obligatory warning on the paint can about using the product in a well-ventilated area, so we turned on the ceiling fan and a fan outside the doorway to keep the air moving. Despite entering the colder months, we occasionally cranked the windows open for a bit of fresh air too. While you shouldn't chance it if you're just not comfortable with the idea, I will say that my wife and I scrutinized just about everything when she was pregnant--including this--and didn't really feel it was a threat based on what we had read or heard from others. Hope that helps!

Such a help! Thank you!!

I'm really glad you liked it! To answer your question, the only colors we used were blue (Behr Inked M510-7 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M510-7) and yellow (Behr Frittata M290-2 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M290-2). The sky was just the straight Frittata yellow. The mountains were actually a series of mixtures of the Inked blue and the yellow Frittata. The closest mountain in the "foreground" was just solid Inked blue. The remaining four mountain ranges were a mixture of the blue and yellow (as well as some pure white paint to make the mixture lighter). The closer mountain ranges were heavier on the blue and the more "distant" mountain ranges had a greater ratio of the yellow (and some white). It was a very inexact science trying to get the right mixture of blue and yellow and white for the five different mountain ranges. We basically got five cheap quart-sized paint buckets and experimented mixing the blue and yellow in order to get just enough contrast between each set of mountain ranges. Sometimes our buckets were too close in color, so we'd have to keep mixing in more paint to get the right colors. Before we even painted the five shades of blue/yellow on the wall we painted stripes of each color next to each other on a white piece of paper just to make sure the colors contrasted enough. As you can see from the video, we painted the sky first, then painted the lighted, most distant mountain range first, and worked our way into the darker mountains in the foreground. One word of warning: make sure when you create each blue/yellow mountain color mixture that you make enough of each batch to cover the desired area. If you run out of one of the mixtures it will be really difficult to recreate the exact ratio of colors (unless you keep track of the amounts you've mixed) and most likely your hue for batch number two will be ever-so-slightly off. Better to have more paint in each mixture than not enough. Hope that helps you!

Matt Bitzer thank you soooo much

Thank you, @Umm Yusuf! As you can see at the 4:01 mark in the video, we used cardboard in the shape of a Christmas tree to give us the approximate footprint of the tree on the wall, though the cardboard itself wasn't the stamp. This shape was loosely based on a template similar to this image: www.vectorstock.com/royalty-free-vector/christmas-tree-black-silhouette-icon-vector-20514831. While you'd typically have to pay for that image, you can always download a "preview" of that image for free. After all, you're only using the shape, so you don't care about the watermarks on the image. Or, just run a Google search for "christmas tree silhouette" and find a better image. Regardless, we used this image, cut it out, and traced it on cardboard. We then cut out the cardboard tree shape. This would serve as the rigid base for our tree stamp. If you take a look at the 4:01 mark in the video, you can see the tree stamps we made next to two sheets of 8.5"x11" paper. The tallest of the five tree stamps was an inch or two shy of the full sheet of paper, so maybe about 9-10" tall. The smallest tree was about 6-7". The three remaining tree heights were distributed somewhere between those high and low ranges. We also varied the widths of each tree to give some variety to the foliage, as you can see at the 4:04 mark. The widths probably averaged around 5" or so. In the end, our goal was to create some variety in the trees without having such a stark and awkward contrast between the largest and the smallest tree. Each tree had some variation in the branches too, which helped avoid some of that cookie-cutter feel. Also, by positioning the tree trunk part of the stamp so it overlapped more of the mountain or less of the mountain, we were able to play with the tree heights even more. So, for example, when we used tree stamp #1, sometimes we would position the bottom edge of the trunk so it was pretty flush with the edge of the mountain silhouette. Other times we dropped tree stamp #1 lower so that it looked as though the tree didn't even have much of a trunk (the trunk actually overlapped the mountain itself). We didn't actually want the cardboard shape to touch the wall. As you can see from the video at the 4:00 mark, the cardboard isn't the stamp itself. For the stamp itself we used a mint-green colored foam (the color of the foam doesn't matter--just mentioning it so you can identify it in the video). As you can see, the foam is really just the branches of the tree, not the full tree with needles and all. We used the tree stencil to determine the approximate outline of the tree branches on the foam, but then within that outline we drew in the tree trunk and the branches. We then cut out the tree trunk and branches on the foam and glued that "tree skeleton" to the full cardboard tree shape. This gave us our stamp: the raised green foam trunk and branches on a firm cardboard base. Unfortunately, our foam was a bit think, so I'd suggest getting thicker foam that will prevent the cardboard from getting covered in paint and possibly smudging on the wall. Ideally, only the foam would get covered in paint and stamped to the wall. Stamping this tree in the paint allowed us to stamp a tree trunk with bare branches all along the wall--no leaves/needles. From there we hand painted on the needles for each tree over top of the bare branches. We did this because we wanted to ensure that there was some variety in our trees. Using a full tree stamp for all the trees (instead of just the branches) would provide great, consistent trees, but they would look very cookie cutter and unnatural. Instead, we stamped the tree trunk and branches to the wall and painted on the needles for each tree...and there were a lot. Yes, it was a lot more work, but the variety in the results made for a more natural, organic look. Also, as you can see from the video, we made about 3-5 different size tree stamps, again to give some variety to our trees. We used the same process to create the larger/smaller stamps, but some of the trees had greater or fewer branches in order to increase the variety. We used a small angled paintbrush to then hand paint the pine needles over the branch/trunk stencils. This also gave some variety to our forest and ensured that not every tree was an identical clone of the one beside it. Add to that the fact that my wife and I paint pine needles very differently and you've got a pretty good looking mountain forest! Finally, I even glued a little tab of cardboard to the back of the cardboard tree shape in order to have a grip that would allow me to lift the stamp without having to grab the edges of the cardboard tree and possibly smudge the paint. Hope this helps!

@@mattbitzer thank you so much for your thorough explanation, I can’t wait to do ours! Do you think using pink shades would work too for a girls rooms? Btw I noticed the grip on the template, such a great idea!

Happy to help! Yes, I think you can really make the room work with any compatible color combinations. You could certainly make it work with different shades of pink. You could do the entire wall shades of pink, from the mountains to the sky to the trees if you really wanted to stay with that color. As long as you have a strong enough contrast between the different "layers" you could definitely make that work. Or you could use pink as the primary color and find another harmonious hue using a color wheel like this one: color.adobe.com/create/color-wheel. I know this tool has helped me take some of the guess work out of color matching. Good luck!

Hello Βάσια! Thank you for your kind words! The only colors we used were blue (Behr Inked M510-7 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M510-7), yellow (Behr Frittata M290-2 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M290-2), and some plain white paint. The sky was just the straight Frittata yellow. The mountains were actually a series of mixtures of the Inked blue and the yellow Frittata. The closest mountain in the "foreground" was just solid Inked blue. The remaining four mountain ranges were a mixture of the blue and yellow (and even a little bit of plain white paint for the lighter colored mountains). The closer mountain ranges were heavier on the blue and the more "distant" mountain ranges had a greater ratio of the yellow and the white. We had to add white to the lighter, more distant mountain ranges because simply mixing the blue and the yellow was still too dark. We found that if we didn't add the white paint, there simply wasn't enough contrast between the more distant mountain ranges. We had to add the white to lighten it up a bit. Also, I think we got the paint that had the primer mixed in already, as I recall.

Well, this answer was what I really need! Thank you dear!!! I' m doing it in a couple of days! Best wishes for your sweet family!

Thank you!

Yes, there were a couple of Pinterest images from which we drew inspiration, including several of mountainscapes of varying colors. In addition, there was another nursery that featured hot air balloons that we used as models for our own. So many talented and creative people out there. We just drew from the ideas that we liked most in each design.

Hi @winnetouch, as you can see at the 4:01 mark in the video, we used cardboard in the shape of Christmas tree to give us the approximate footprint of the tree on the wall, though the cardboard wasn't the stamp. This shape was loosely based on a template similar to this image: www.vectorstock.com/royalty-free-vector/christmas-tree-black-silhouette-icon-vector-20514831. While you'd typically have to pay for that image, you can always download a "preview" of that image for free. After all, you're only using the shape, so you don't care about the watermarks on the image. Or, just run a Google search for "christmas tree silhouette" and find a better image. Regardless, we used this image, cut it out, and traced it on cardboard. We then cut out the cardboard tree shape. This would serve as the rigid base for our tree stamp. We didn't actually want the cardboard shape to touch the wall. Of course, as you can see from the video at the 4:00 mark, the cardboard isn't the stamp itself. For the stamp itself we used a mint-green colored foam (the color of the foam doesn't matter--just mentioning it so you can identify it in the video). As you can see, the foam is really just the branches of the tree, not the full tree with needles and all. We used the tree stencil to determine the approximate outline of the tree branches on the foam, but then within that outline we drew in the tree trunk and the branches. We then cut out the tree trunk and branches on the foam and glued that "tree skeleton" to the full cardboard tree shape. This gave us our stamp: the raised green foam trunk and branches on a firm cardboard base. Unfortunately, our foam was a bit think, so I'd suggest getting thicker foam that will prevent the cardboard from getting covered in paint and possibly smudging on the wall. Ideally, only the foam would get covered in paint and stamped to the wall. Stamping this tree in the paint allowed us to stamp a tree trunk with bare branches all along the wall--no leaves/needles. From there we hand painted on the needles for each tree over top of the bare branches. We did this because we wanted to ensure that there was some variety in our trees. Using a full tree stamp for all the trees (instead of just the branches) would provide great, consistent trees, but they would look very cookie cutter and unnatural. Instead, we stamped the tree trunk and branches to the wall and painted on the needles for each tree...and there were a lot. Yes, it was a lot more work, but the variety in the results made for a more natural, organic look. Also, as you can see from the video, we made about 3-5 different size tree stamps, again to give some variety to our trees. We used the same process to create the larger/smaller stamps, but some of the trees had greater or fewer branches in order to increase the variety. Finally, I even glued a little tab of cardboard to the back of the cardboard tree shape in order to have a grip that would allow me to lift the stamp without having to grab the edges and possibly smudge the paint. Hope this helps! Good luck with your nursery!

@@mattbitzer Whoah, that was detailed :D. Thank you for taking the time to explain.

@@mattbitzer We didn't end up using the stencils. They just didn't work for us :P. I ended up freehanding all the trees :).

@@winnetouch I'm glad you found a workaround! I'm sure the freehanding was much more time consuming, but probably led to trees that were less cookie cutter than our approach. I'm sure your little one will love it nonetheless!

+Honey Kat Opal Thanks for watching! Actually, if you're referring to the "Trust No One" shirt, it's an X-Files reference. But I see where it could apply to Gravity Falls too. :-)

Lol... Sorry! XD I thought I saw the GF horizon in the letters... XD

Thanks, Taufik!

Thanks, Bledi Saliko! We actually made those balloons! The balloons are really just plain, white Japanese lanterns painted with acrylic paint. My wife's steady hand painted the straight lines on each section of the balloon and kept the alternating white/color stripes equal in size around the lantern. We found the baskets on Amazon or an online craft store. They have about a 4 inch diameter top and the bottom might be about 3 inches in diameter. Originally, the baskets had handles, but we just clipped those off with scissors. For the 4 sandbags on each side of the baskets, we used some thin canvas material cut into 4x4 inch squares. We put a balled up piece of tissue in the middle to give the bag some shape and then pulled all four corners of the canvas up around the tissue. We then took a couple of inches of twine and tied it around the top so it looked like a sack of sand with a rope cinching the top closed. We then used a hot glue gun to glue each sandbag to the side of the basket. It took us a while to get the size of the sandbags proportionate with the basket. The first ones we created were way to big and dwarfed the basket, making the whole thing look off. Trust me, the bags were frustrating to make. Switching back to the balloon, we had to find the netting to cover the top of the balloon. We got lucky and found a nautical-themed decoration pack at a local craft store. Basically, the pack contained sea trinkets, like shells, a natural sponge, cork, a starfish, and some fishing net. We only needed the net. We cut the net into a square. One side of the square was probably no longer than half the circumference of the balloon. This was another guessing game for us. I'd suggest starting with a square piece of net that's too big and then cutting it smaller until it fits over the balloon top. We wanted our netting to hang so that each corner dangled down to about the equator of the balloon. Keep in mind that this kind of net stretches with the weight of the basket (once attached), so we cut our net a little smaller so that the weight of the basket pulled the corners of the net down to about the equator of the balloon. The net is not attached to the balloon in any way--it just rests on top. The basket is then attached to the four corners of the net with regular twine. It took a while for us to get the basket to sit right (the baskets always wanted to tilt because our net wasn't always seated perfectly and our twine lengths were off ever-so slightly (despite our best attempts to keep them equal). The twine attached to the top rim of the basket at four different equally spaced points. I believe we threaded the twine from the outside of the basket to the inside and just tied a knot. The knot was not visible since it was on the inside of the basket. And the knot was thick enough that it couldn't pull through the basket strands. That way we didn't have loop the twine around one of the basket strands. The flags on the balloon are from a birthday cake topping package. We just draped the string of flags from one corner of the netting to the other all around the circumference of the balloon and just tied it to the net at each corner. Finally, we dangled the completed balloon from the ceiling with "fishing wire" (just strong, invisible thread) we got at a craft store. We screwed some small white hooks into the ceiling and attached one end of the fishing wire to the hook and the other to the metal hanger within the top of the Japanese lantern. We then added a light-weight stuffed animal to each basket. And there you have your balloon!

Good call, Mirrored Bandit! I didn't notice that until just now, but it's pretty spot on. I suppose I owe the state a debt of gratitude for both its famous potatoes and its inspirational license plates.

Sounds like a good alternative color to try out.

Thanks for the compliment, but if you were to look a little closer you'd realize how imperfect many of those trees happen to be! :-) To answer your question, though, overall the stencils you see around 4:04 really helped. They only provided the branches, but they helped create consistency in size and shape for all the trees. The fact that we had 5 different sized trees gave some variety to the landscape without deviating too far from the evergreen tree shape. We used a small angled paintbrush to then hand paint the pine needles over the branch/trunk stencils. This also gave some variety to our forest and ensured that not every tree was an identical clone of the one beside it. Add to that the fact that my wife and I paint pine needles very differently and you've got a pretty good looking mountain forest!

So cardboard and over the top? I'm trying to figure out what the top layer is. :-) thanks for your answers and such !

I totally understand you used a stamp of sorts to paint the tree frame on, I am just stuck on what you guys used over the cardboard, was it craft foam?

Yes, we got some craft foam and used that for the branches. We glued the foam tree to a cardboard rectangle and then cut out a rough shape of a tree around it. The cardboard simply gave the stamp some rigidity so it was easier to work with. The shape of the cardboard really didn't matter (we probably could have left it as a rectangle), since it was the foam that would be making contact with the wall; however, by cutting the cardboard to the general shape of the tree it gave us a better sense of where the foam branches were when we pressed it against the wall. One bit of advice though: use thicker foam if you can find that. Because our foam was rather thin, when we stamped the tree stamp into the paint a lot of the paint would get on the cardboard. We had to be really careful when we pressed the stamp on the wall that only the foam part left a mark and not the cardboard backing. Having thicker foam would have given us a little more room for error because there would have been a greater difference in depth between the foam and the cardboard. If you can't find thicker foam, you might even consider gluing two layers of foam together to give it more depth. I also glued two little handles to the back of the cardboard stamps so that I had something better to grip. This allowed me to handle the stamps without having to claw at the edges of the stamp to pull it away from the wall. Much easier to control that way.

The only colors we used were blue (Behr Inked M510-7 at www.behr. com/consumer /ColorDetailView/M 510-7) and yellow (Behr Frittata M290-2 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M290-2). The sky was just the straight Frittata yellow. The mountains were actually a series of mixtures of the Inked blue and the yellow Frittata. The closest mountain in the "foreground" was just solid Inked blue. The remaining four mountain ranges were a mixture of the blue and yellow (as well as some pure white paint to make the mixture lighter). The closer mountain ranges were heavier on the blue and the more "distant" mountain ranges had a greater ratio of the yellow (and some white).

Hi Jatin, the only colors we used were blue (Behr Inked M510-7 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M510-7, yellow (Behr Frittata M290-2 at www.behr.com/consumer/ColorDetailView/M290-2), and pure white. The sky was just the straight Frittata yellow. The mountains were actually a series of mixtures of the Inked blue and the yellow Frittata. The closest mountain in the "foreground" was just solid Inked blue. The remaining four mountain ranges were a mixture of the blu, yellow, and white. The closer mountain ranges were heavier on the blue and the more "distant" mountain ranges had a greater ratio of the yellow. We weren't able to get the more distant mountain ranges light enough only using the blue and yellow paint. Adding white to that mixture allowed us to make those mountains a little lighter.

I wish I had a video of how we created those hot air balloons, but we don't. I can, however, give you a quick overview of how we did it. First, we got a pack of the white Japanese paper lanterns (spherical) and used acrylic paint to paint the sections of the balloon. I want to say they were about 12" in diameter. Once painted, we set those aside to dry. Then we found some little baskets about 3" cubed that served as the hot air balloon baskets. As I recall, I think we got baskets that had handles and then just cut off the handles. I think we ordered those on Amazon or found them at Hobby Lobby. We also picked up some burlap strips at Hobby Lobby, cut them into small squares (about 2" a side) and folded them around small balls of tissue and tied the tops together with string to form little sandbags on each side of each basket. These little burlap sand bags were then glued to the basket with a hot glue gun. We also found some fish netting at Hobby Lobby that we cut into large squares (about 12" a side). We draped these over the tops of the painted lanterns. We then used about 8"-12" of thin twine to tie each corner of the square-cut fish net to one corner of the basket. Once all four corners were tied, the basket would essentially dangle below the lantern on the 4 pieces of twine tied to the fishing net. The fishing next simply rested on top of the balloon unsecured. The weight of the basket (and the small stuffed animal passenger it carried) was enough weight to keep the fishing net in place on top of the balloon. We also found the tiny string of flags at Hobby Lobby. I believe they were near the stencils and stationary or stickers section. I don't recall exactly. But we tethered the string of flags to the point on the balloons where the fishing net and the twine supporting the baskets connects. As you can see, we had the string of flags dip from point to point rather than being pulled taut. Finally, we put some small white hooks in the nursery room ceiling and used fishing wire to dangle the completed balloons from the hooks. Sorry I don't have a better walkthrough, but hopefully that will give you a good place to start! Good luck!

@@mattbitzer u tube plays adds on ur videos.. Did they pay you

@@mattbitzer thanks a lot for the detailed reply.. will try to make it

@@likerheatandon3278 You're very welcome!

Hi Katarina, I'm interested in hearing what you have to say. Let me know the best way for us to get in touch.

@@mattbitzer Hi Mat could you please out your email in your channel ABOUT section because it won't post mine here

@@katarinastankovic7303 done!

@@mattbitzer sorry but I can't see it anywhere, can you just put your email in the bellow your video where you've written the text, thanks

@@katarinastankovic7303 sorry about that. Just fixed it. I can see it in there now.

Thank you, Harry! What exactly would you like me to send? I have the design layout and grid for each of the three walls, as well as the stencils for the trees. I'd be happy to send those if you'd like.

@matt Bitzer. We had started work since the last saturday. Here is our room, now facebook link scontent.fhan2-2.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/18222402_1534623519915810_6998942088583969180_n.jpg?oh=27c2a2bb941eda12ba25bff9e5d69b3f&oe=59B30605. We created a concept that looks like video above. I will show you when we completed our room on the next saturday. We have a trouble about stencils for the trees. It's hard to make a tree stamp by paper. So we decided to use drawing method.

Harry, thanks for sharing a photo of your work so far--it looks fantastic! Very impressive that you've come that far since Saturday, too! Yes, the trees were a little more complicated than the mountains. Basically, we made our own tree stamps as you can see from our video. So the trees weren't really stencils (we didn't trace anything on the walls), they were stamps (we dipped them in paint and pressed them against the wall). At the 4:00 mark of the video you can see how we made these. You'll notice that the tree stamps are really made of two separate materials: there is the cardboard frame that's in the rough shape of the tree and there is the mint green foam material that served as the stamp itself. The green foam was cut into the shape of bare tree branches (you'll notice that the green branches look much thinner than normal pine trees). This green foam was then glued onto a rough cardboard outline of the tree. We didn't care about the shape of the cardboard because the cardboard wasn't making any contact with our paint or the wall--only the green foam was. So once we glued the green foam tree onto the cardboard we could then press the stamp in a pool of blue paint and then stamp it on the wall where we wanted our tree. That's why you'll notice on the 4:00 mark the two trees on the right are still mint green, while the tree on the left has already been dipped in the blue paint. We only wanted the green foam to make contact with the wall. From there we would paint on the leaves/needles later. At the 4:08 mark you can see that I even glued little cardboard "handles" on the back of the stamp so that I could get a better grip on the tree as I dipped it in the paint and then stamped it on the wall. Once we stamped the "skeleton" of the tree on the wall, we then let it dry. We usually stamped about 10-20 prints on the wall at a time and then let them dry before moving to the next step. Once the tree stamp was dry on the wall we went back and painted on the fluffy needles of the tree over top of the branches. This allowed us to create greater variation in the tree designs since it was hard to recreate exact copies of the trees freehand. At the 4:12 mark you can see a close up of the painted trees on the wall. Notice that we started with the bare tree branches and then painted over it with smaller branches/needles by hand. Keep in mind that sometimes our stamps didn't make good contact with the wall or we didn't have enough paint on the stamp to make a solid print. In those instances, we just went back with a paintbrush and filled in the missing spots of the tree trunk or branches with more paint. Hope that helps to clarify our process a bit more.

Hi Pop4UErgo! We made each balloon from scratch. Unfortunately, I don’t recall the exact amount we spend on these items, as it now been over 3 years since the project. I also don’t recall the exact quantities or sizes of each item; however, I tried to find these items again on Amazon to give you a place to start. Just take into consideration that you may need more of the items below than what I listed (for example, you may need more of the the mini flag bunting that encircles the balloon than what I list below). When we originally did this project, these items were purchased at either Amazon, Hobby Lobby, or Home Depot. I’ll try to indicate where I got each item in the list below. Hope this helps: Blank white Japanese lanterns (for balloons) - $11 (originally bought at Hobby Lobby) www.amazon.com/Just-Artifacts-White-Paper-Lanterns/dp/B01CEXADGQ/ref=sr_1_7?keywords=japanese+lanterns&qid=1554901566&s=gateway&sr=8-7 Acrylic Paint Set (to paint the lanterns) - $18 (originally bought at Hobby Lobby) www.amazon.com/Apple-Barrel-Acrylic-PROMOABI-Assorted/dp/B00ATJSD8I/ref=sr_1_3?crid=166RC7FD0VTL5&keywords=acrylic%2Bpaint%2Bset&qid=1554900796&s=gateway&sprefix=acry%2Caps%2C159&sr=8-3&th=1&psc=1 (Don’t forget the paint brushes! We already had those so I didn’t include them here.) Fish Net (lays atop the balloons) - $8 (originally bought at Hobby Lobby) www.amazon.com/Decorations-Accessory-Big-Mos-Toys/dp/B0757TMQG5/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=craft+netting&qid=1554901659&s=gateway&sr=8-1 Twine (strings that hold the baskets to the balloon) - $6 (originally bought at Home Depot) www.amazon.com/Awefrank-Christmas-Industrial-Materials-Applications/dp/B07BC63QST/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=twine&qid=1554901746&s=gateway&sr=8-4 Fishing wire (to dangle the balloons from the ceiling) - $4 (originally bought at Home Depot) www.amazon.com/Beadsmith-Illusion-Monofilament-Bead-164ft/dp/B002RTKGW4/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=fishing+wire&qid=1554901812&s=gateway&sr=8-4 Hooks (to hang the balloons from the ceiling) - $8 (originally bought at Home Depot) www.amazon.com/eBoot-Inches-Ceiling-Hooks-Holder/dp/B019Z6VJJA/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=ceiling+hooks&qid=1554901839&s=gateway&sr=8-3 Baskets (to sit beneath the balloons) - $33 (originally bought at Amazon.com) www.amazon.com/Small-Woodchip-Country-Basket-Styles/dp/B01BKX2Q98/ref=sr_1_18?keywords=mini+baskets&qid=1554901957&s=gateway&sr=8-18 Linen fabric (for the sandbags on the sides of the baskets) - $7 (originally bought at Hobby Lobby) www.amazon.com/Caydo-Needlework-Garments-Accessories-62-Inch/dp/B075Q9CV33/ref=sr_1_12?keywords=linen+for+crafts&qid=1554903221&s=gateway&sr=8-12 (You could also buy your own pre-made small burlap bags, but we decided to make our own as most of the premade bags were too big) Mini flags/bunting (to drape around the equator of the balloons) - $8 (originally bought at Hobby Lobby) I'm sure they still have these at Hobby Lobby but I was only able to find these at Etsy right now,. This will give you an idea of the flags you’ll need: www.etsy.com/listing/572374728/2-metres-of-mini-small-bunting-flags?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=mini+small+bunting&ref=sr_gallery-1-14&organic_search_click=1&pro=1 Tissue (to fill the linen sandbags) - Free-ish (just took these out of a Kleenex box at home)

@Matt, thanks for taking the time to search all these needed items. I now have a gold idea on how to completely make them. Your nursery is by the way amazing and much more to be desired since it’s a fun activity for couples to do.

@@Astrokhels you're very welcome! I'm glad I could help.

Yep, eyeballin' for those imperfect yet natural mountainsides 😁

Not yet, but I've got the books ready for him when that day comes!