DIY ⎜ Hand Made Cards

I got the -we’ll call it- hankering to make some cards after Heather made this adorable invitation to a baby shower. How precious is it?! I loved it and became inspired to make some of my own…

All of the supplies can be found at Michaels or Stampin’ Up. Brandy sells Stampin’ Up supplies and has hundreds of card ideas for you to get inspiration from! Her site had lots of ideas where I started with what the general look of my cards should be. The majority of my supplies are from Michaels, WalMart, and yard sales though.

So to make this card I started with the above paper colors and sliced them down to different sizes.

I used this punch from Michaels to make the part that I would then stamp with a green plant stamp from Stampin’ Up

Next I used the purple punch to make holes that I then hammered the eyelets or brass-thing-a-ma-giggys though with the tool kit to the right. All found at Michaels, or if you’re lucky a yard sale.

Then the yellow ribbon was threaded through and wrapped around the purple before I glued the purple large piece to the actual card. This way people open up the card and don’t see strings glued to the inside from a wrap-around. To the right are stickies that make it more 3-D. I also recommend the roll-tape, makes life soooo easy.

The finished product. Looks much prettier photographed outside non?

This seems a good time for confessions… I am one of those people who is a half-crafter. I get about half-way through and get frustrated and tired and either give up or add it to the alarmingly growing stock pile of unfinished projects under my bed. So to help prevent frustration I cut a lot of things, punched a lot of holes, strung a lot of ribbon, and stamped the same. All to prevent having to clean stamps 400 times and figure out cuts different ways. Because trust me, it gets tedious fast! So this is the above, modified.

I added a little something something to each of the envelopes depending on what theme/stamp I was currently dirtying up.

This is probably my favorite card I made. The bird and “wish big” stamp are from Stampin’ Up and the birdhouse from Michaels dollar bin. The twigs the bird is resting on are from some random skewers I saved from my favorite job, TanCo, like 3 years ago… I am that girl- “Oh hey let me save those for scrapbooking!” **weird looks all around**

It totally came in handy though… take that Hoarders!

This was a card that took a lot of effort. I may never actually give it to anyone because it was that time consuming…

What should have been simple was this lovely ink pad called “Distress Ink” from Michaels. Well you crumble paper, blot it with this ink, then spritiz with water, let dry over night… getting the picture? I was in distress by the end of it. But. I love it. Yes, I agree, I should probably work on my dabbing skills to make it less dark.

Again, the stamps for this are from Stampin’ Up. The bow you can barely see holding the “thank you” is waxed twine from Michaels and also used on the “best wishes” card. It’s very easy to maneuver and curl compared to most stuff that size- my big fingers don’t mesh well tying small bows… Then the holes for the pink brads were punched with the purple punch at the top of this post- both from Michaels.

The tags for this were cut with the Cricut. Which in hindsight I should have used to begin with for all the cutting to save me frustration.

The punches that back the “make a wish” are from Stampin’ Up as well as the words. The birthday candles are form the dollar bin at Michaels. Ribbon is what the lines are and was attached with the zots- these amazingly easy glue things. Trust me, I have been down the path of just using glue sticks from Dollar Tree to save money and most of those projects are under my bed still. The money spent on glue dots, tape, and other adhesives will make you so much happier.

Same thing, punches from Stampin’ Up. This was just some bright color choices in paper and ribbon put together. Suggestions for improvement- buy punches that are more different in size. You can hardly see the circle behind these. I like Heathers (1st card) because you can see the size difference.

 

This was one of my favorites. Nursery Rhyme paper from Michaels. The bow is made of raffia grass- which I think was from a florist, but probably can be found at Michaels?

Yay! So hopefully you’re fired up and ready to get crafty! That or thinking I got a little carried away on the text on this post =) Either way, much love and thanks and “best wishes” on your craft projects!