Places We’ve Been – Heart Map Art

My husband and I love to travel. Between the two of us we’ve been to over 20 countries! And of course we are planning to add more countries under our belts as time goes on. I love adding travel decor to our home to remind us of the great places we’ve been and the fun memories we’ve created, (like my travel gallery wall, quote map art, and wood slab map) and so I decided to make some fun map art of a few of the trips we’ve taken together!

Map Art Materials

• Printer
• Cardstock
• Silhouette Machine, heart-shaped punch, or scissors
• Scrapbook Paper
• Glue Stick
• Picture Frame

I used my Silhouette machine for this project, but you can just as easily make this map art using a heart-shaped hole punch or some plain ol’ scissors! If you using a Silhouette, follow the steps below; if you are using another method, skip down to Step 4!

Step 1

Find maps online of places you have been. Drag and drop them into the Silhouette Studio software sand size them to fit into some heart shapes (which you can download from the Silhouette Design Store).

Step 2

Erase portions of the maps so they are roughly heart-shaped and go just outside the lines. Select File > Print and print out your page of map hearts with your regular home printer. I printed onto a sheet of cardstock so the hearts would be extra sturdy.

Step 3

Stick your freshly-printed hearts onto a Silhouette cutting mat, and feed into your machine. Back in the software, select the Cut Menu icon (the tiny ratchet blade in the top corner) and set your material to ‘cardstock.’ Change your blade accordingly and hit send to Silhouette!

Step 4

If you used a Silhouette, once your machine stops cutting you should just be able to pop the hearts off the cutting mat! If you don’t own a Silhouette, you can make these map hearts by using a punch or by using some good old fashioned scissors!

Glue your hearts down on a piece of scrapbook paper and frame! That’s it!

Et voila – a beautiful piece of travel map art that you can show off to commemorate all of your special trips! Make the hearts smaller to add more, or bigger if you haven’t been many places yet, or only want to highlight a few cities or countries.

For my map art, I decided to choose six destinations: San Francisco in California, The University of Washington/Seattle in Washington State, Puerto Vallarta in Mexico, Belfast in Ireland, Disney World/Universal Studios in Florida, and Machu Picchu/Cusco in Peru (check out my trip summary HERE!). All of these trips are special to me and my husband and I put them in roughly chronological order for reminiscence sake.

San Francisco – the first trip we took together (we were only still dating at the time!)

Seattle – this wasn’t really a trip, but we both moved to the University District, which is where our whole relationship blossomed, and where we got engaged!

Puerto Vallarta – our honeymoon spot!

Belfast, Ireland – our favorite city in our first cross-ocean journey together!

Lake Buena Vista, Florida – Nate’s first time at Disney World!

Machu Picchu, Peru – our biggest bucket list trip/adventure!

It’s so great to have a way to save these memories and display them in our home for years to come. It was fun to take a little trip down memory lane as I was putting this map art together – we’ve done so many fun things together and I can wait to cross off even more countries and trips and adventures on our bucket lists!

Love the project? Pin it! <3

What’s the coolest place you’ve ever been to?