Papercrafts

For my Mom’s birthday I gave her this photo album with pictures from our recent trip to England.  I wasn’t all that impress with the albums I’d seen in stores so I made this one with scrapbooking paper, card stock and vellum inserts.  Two simple hole punches and ribbon hold it all together.

The cover paper is from a line called Travel by American Crafts. Their site has an interesting idea gallery and a pretty nice blog!  So, if you enjoy papercrafting its worth checking out. 

Additional patterns from Travel paper series Heat movie download

Adhesive photo corners helped keep everything in place

Pretty vellum prevents the photos from sticking to each other

All this project took were a few supplies, a steady hand and a little time.  No sewing or drawing skills required. I used my new Cricut machine to create the text on the cover.  If you’re interested in how it works stay tuned for an upcoming review.

Today I participated in a papercrafting workshop at Red Lead.  I learned about the store through Beth’s blog. It’s a great store but sometimes I get overwhelmed by all they have to offer and I never know what to do with it hence the need for the workshop.

The shadow box workshop was ideal because it combined painting, papercutting, fabric and sewing.  I decided ahead of time to personalize the project with a favorite photo of my grandparents.

Having never taken a workshop on this before I learned that there were quite a few supplies missing from my tool kit but fear not the ladies of Red Lead have everything.  They have paper, 50 kinds of glue and all kinds of vintage images and trinkets.  The list goes on and on.

The thing I enjoyed most was learning some new techniques.  They have some fun workshops coming up in April and although, I’m not sure the finished product is my style I’m still curious to see how it works.

A while ago I created a new logo for my design work.  I played with my initials and came up with dHb Designs using the d and b to create the H. I thought it was sort of cleaver.  Simple but different.

Although I enjoy creating my own custom stamps this was one that needed to be laser cut. I submitted the design to rubberstamps.net and within the same week it arrived in my mailbox.  I was pretty impressed! I played around with the ink consistency as you can see here.

For now, it will come in handy when I’m working on my papercrafts and gifts.  If I could just find the time to get www.dhbdesigns.com up and running!

A few months ago I was invited to participate in a holiday gift exchange named The Midwest 12 Days. The rules of the exchange are to create 12 identical handmade gifts no larger than 4 by 6 inches. The gifts are then mailed out in the first week of December.  At the same time 12 gifts from other participants will start showing up in my mailbox. Who doesn’t love getting mail!

Since we haven’t exchanged gifts yet I can’t show you what I made but I can show you the packaging I worked on this weekend. Each person is assigned a number to correspond with the day that their gift will be opened. So, this is what I came up with.  It’s simple but I like how they turned out.  I guess I need to add Exacto blades to my Christmas wish list this year!  I’m looking forward to seeing what everyone else comes up with.

With the holidays right around the corner, I got a jump start on my crafty do-to-list last week.  I could wait till after Thanksgiving to share this one, but why wait, right?  So, if you plan to gift a bottle of anything this holiday season, skip the store-bought wine bag and whip up these handmade hang tags. They’re so easy with the stencil I’ve provided below.

Here’s all you need:

• Two-sided scrapbooking paper ( I used Pear Tree by American Crafts )
• Stencil (click to download)
• Exacto knife
• Ruler
• Circle cutter (not necessary but speeds up the process)
• Pop-Up Glue Dots

  Once Upon A Time In The West trailer

  (found at most craft stores)

Step 1:  Once printed, I recommend tracing the above stencil onto a piece of cardboard especially if you plan to make more than one.  I made a template for the hang tag (1) and another template for the ornament cut-out (2).

Step 2:  Trace template 1 and 2 onto the scrapbooking paper and with a steady hand start cutting.  I used the scissors on larger sections and an Exacto on the corners but it’s whatever you feel comfortable with.

Step 3:  Next, cut the bottle neck opening.  I used the circle cutter to speed up the process but sharp scissors can also work.

Step 4:  With a ruler and dull Exacto blade or butter knife score the back side of the tag (use the dotted line on the template as a guide).  Bend to the desired angle.

Step 5:  Write a personal message on the ornament and using a single Glue Dot attach the ornament to the tag and your done!

If you decide to give this tutorial a try I would love to see and hear how it turned out. Happy crafting!

Thanks to the inspiring artist Elsa Mora, I decided to give papercutting a try this weekend. At first, I wasn’t exactly sure what to start with but I knew I should keep it simple. I have a photo of the Dogwood tree (in bloom) that can be found in our back yard.  The blooms don’t last long so I went crazy with the digital camera!

• Mirror Mirror video

Anyway, I used the photo as inspiration for the stencil.  I started with some 80lb paper I had on hand but it was just too heavy to cut through and lost 3 exacto blades in the process.  As I was finishing up the 2nd attempt I held it up to my work lamp and realized that it made for a really cool effect!

This attempt was done on scrapbooking paper. I don’t really scrapbook, I just like the double-sided paper.  If you look closely you can see the dotted background of the paper.

I plan on reusing this stencil to make a linocut stamp. It will be interesting to see the same design but with 2 different applications.