Introduction: Make a Keychain:D

Buying cool keychains can start to get expensive. This is gonna show you how you can make them yourself. The picture shows a few that are finished that i have already made. Hope you enjoy:)

Step 1: Materials

First things first we need the materials.

what your gonna needs:
styrofoam board (or heavy duty paper or watever like matt board. should be thick tho)
scissors (i prefer to have a couple different sizes)
chain
glue
knife (exacto knives work too but i didnt have one so i just used a sharp kitchen knife)
your image (printed off pc, taken with a camera, drawn, just any kind of picture)
key rings
needle (or something sharp to make the hole with)
metal rings
markers (optional)

i know in the pic theres ribbon too but i didnt use it so yeah. theres also a hole bunch of optional stuff you could use too like glitter, sequence, stuff like that.

Step 2: "Trace" the Image

so in the title i put trace in quotations because you want to draw around your image but not so its identical. what i mean is that the area youre going to cut from the board has to be bigger than the image you chose. the picture i chose is in the shape of a circle. i cut out a bigger circle out of the board than what the image was. ik ik its confusing but if you dont get it skip to the step where you glue the image onto the board so that you can see what i mean about the board being bigger than your image before you draw or cut anything.

Step 3: Cut the Board

For this step i prefer to use a knife because if you use scissors it tends to bend the styrofoam (for my board at least). All you do it cut around the image you drew on the board (for me the circle). Once its cut you have to take it out. The board i have has a paper side, then the styrofoam, then another paper side. if thats the case, when you punch out the piece the edges will look all rough and torn. we'll take care of that in the next step, :).

1st pic: sort of demonstrating cutting out board piece thing (also sorry that the first picture is sideways)
2nd pic: what it should look like after you cut it but didnt punch it out yet
3rd pic: what it should look like after you cut and punch it out

Step 4: Prep Stuff

for this step all you really do is cut along the top and bottom so that it looks nicer and not so tornish like. If you want to glue the image on befor you do this so that you dont cut off too much thats perfectly fine.

1st pic: after cut 
2nd pic: before

TIP: you dont want to cut off too much. just enough so that it looks nice. you dont really have to do this step but i find it helps when your cutting the excess board off to have clean edges.

Step 5: Glueing

all you do is glue the image to the peice of board you cut out

Step 6: Cut Off the Excess

Snip around the picture to cut off all the remaining board. Make sure you don't cut off to much and make sure you dont cut the picture when cutting the board.

TIP: if you want you can color the back of the board to match the picture. my picture is a greyish black kind of colaboration so i colored the back of my board black instead of leaving it black.

1st pic: what you want it to look like after you cut off the excess
2nd pic: the back colored in

Step 7: Making the Hole

To make the hole, push the needle through the top (or where ever you want the hole to be) of the board/pic. I put the hole in the top in the center. Once you have your needle in, move it in a circluar motion so that the hole gets a little bigger.

1st pic: the needle actually in the board
2nd pic: the result after the hole is in it

TIP: dont make too big of a circle! you dont want to rip the top.

Step 8: Adding the Key Ring

If you have tools to seperate the ends of the metal ring then i recommend using them. some metal rings are easy to just bend with your fingers so u can do that too. All metal rings have a slit in them already so you dont have to cut it. If you dont have tools then just use scissors. All u want to do for this part of the step is to seperate the endings so that its not a perfect circle. You need to do this to get it through the hole. Once you have that done then put the one end of the metal ring into the hole and push it through. once the metal ring is through then close up the ends so it stays attached. Once you put the ends back together it should be a cirlce (unless it wasnt a circle to begin with)

1st pic: the result

Step 9: Strengthen the Hole (OPTIONAL)

The board i have is just styrofoam so it can rip pretty easily. what i did to ensure the hole did not rip was put crazy glue around the hole and in the hole. I highly recommend using crazy glue for this because it dries fast and its a strong glue. (sorry i do not have a picture to show this but its pretty self-explainitory)

TIP: The glue i used can discolor some things because it will make it darker so i recommend just doing this on the back.

Step 10: Add the Chain

All you do is add the chain to the metal ring attached to the board. The length is completely up to you. i like to have mine not to long but not to short. like a medium length.

1st pic: the attached chain

TIP: if you have tools (pliers and such) i would recommend using them.

Step 11: Add the Key Ring

Add the key ring to the chain just as you would if you were to chain it to a key chain.

1st pic: The finished project