Laminated colouring pages

Our daughter loves to draw on things purely so she can clean it off, which is really frustrating her when it comes to colouring pages. Not to mention her cloth of choice is a wet wipe which just doesn't end well for the paper.

My solution was pulling out the laminator and ripping some pages out of her colouring books so she can draw and clean to her hearts content! And to make it even easier, the Bluey one from Crayola is all loose pages already.

I just love a super quick and easy project, especially when there isn't a mess to clean up. Added bonus is that the laminator is very interesting to a two year old!

Cards from Colouring Books

Does anyone else have a stack of adult colouring books that you haven't touched for awhile? As a kid I loved colouring in, but as an adult I find it a waste to colour in without a purpose for the finished pages. So since I love stamping and colouring in cards I figured why not colour in my books and stick them on blank cards.

I coloured these in using alcohol ink pens - they don't show up the darker sections where the ink overlaps like sharpies and markers do. For the bigger ones I cut to size first then used double sided tape. The smaller tags are blank business cards. I covered the card with a glue stick, pressed onto the paper and once dry I trimmed it with scissors to match the card.

Desktop Drawers

I always love those cute little decorative drawers that you can buy to clear up all the clutter on your desk. For some reason though I had never bought myself a set, I just have those ugly clear plastic ones that don't actually hide my junk.

Until I saw these and decided it was time for an upgrade that doubles as a craft project.

It was so easy, spread pva glue on scrapbook paper, stick it on the drawer front, smooth out the bubbles then once dry trim the edges with a craft knife. The silver one was actually glitter contact which was the same process since it didn't want to stick to the mdf. So quick to do and it looks so much nicer.

Stamped gift tags

Isn't it great that there are so many beautiful colouring books for adults now? I have always preferred to colour in rather than create the actual drawing. Seeing them everywhere made me decide it was a great time to pull out my stamps and restock my supply of gift tags.

This time I chose to use my watercolour pencils for colouring in, once it is fully dry I use a gel ink pen to redo the outline

Because I used recycled cards I dipped the pencils directly into the water so the colour would show up better. You can blend with a wet paintbrush but I still tend to use a wet pencil for blending.

Tissue Paper Flowers

My grandma gave me a flower punch for my birthday, which happened to be around the same time that I found this tissue paper flower project on the Fiskars website.

This is one of those projects that I, for some reason, just made more and more of without any plan of what I am going to do with them!

They look really pretty individually, so for now I will just keep filling up the box until I figure out how I want to use them. Either way, it is another good project to work on while watching tv.

I reused some of the tissue paper from gifts I have received, so perhaps I will continue the gift wrapping theme and use these flowers rather than the stick on bows I normally buy.

Origami Cymbidium Orchid

For the month of June, I decided to make the Cymbidium Orchid origami flowers from the book "Origami Flowers: Popular Blossoms and Creative Bouquets".

These flowers took me a couple of tries mainly in getting the coloured section to end up in the right place! I'm also not entirely sure of how to crease it properly in the final step.

I probably won't make these again, especially when I have an advanced origami book with a beautiful orchid in it! I'll have to give that flower a go again one day just to share it with you - as well as try out some more pieces from that book.

Origami flowers I have made from this book:

January: Balloon Flower

February: Blue Star

March: Cyclamen

April & May: Hyacinth & Morning Glory

Origami Hyacinth and Morning Glory

Last week I was checking my blog so I could choose an origami flower for May when I noticed I had completely forgotten about the Morning Glory flowers I made last month! For whatever reason I really believed I had not only taken the photos, but also published a blog post about them - obviously I need to do some brain exercises...

For April I decided to try out the Morning Glory origami flowers from the book "Origami Flowers: Popular Blossoms and Creative Bouquets".

Apart from starting with a hexagon, these ones were quite easy to make. While they were quick to finish, I don't really like them and probably won't try them again/

For May I went with the Hyacinth origami flowers since I had mastered the fold needed to make the hexagon paper. 

I really like these flowers, however being a hyacinth you are supposed to attach about 20 of them all to a thick piece of wire. I decided I liked them as single flowers so I suppose they aren't really a hyacinth anymore!

I am thinking of making templates for all of the odd shapes rather than doing the special folds using square paper - especially since the original folds aren't always needed for the flowers. Either way it certainly is interesting to learn new origami techniques.

Origami flowers I have made from this book:

January: Balloon Flower

February: Blue Star

March: Cyclamen

Windmill Cross Stitch

Last week we celebrated Opa and Oma's 50th Anniversary and I had a brilliant idea to create a cross stitch for their gift. I took a photo of a Dutch windmill from their tablecloth and started an attempt to create the cross stitch pattern myself - which was far too difficult! So I found a great website called Pic 2 Pat where you can upload a photo and they will generate a cross stitch pattern for you. It is a really easy to use, free online program which saves a lot of time when creating a custom cross stitch pattern.

With the colours being all over the place for this pattern it took a lot longer than I'm used to, but in the end I finished at least one square each day. 

And of course with a handmade gift you need to give a handmade card so I used watercolour pencils to create a bright flowery card!

Origami Cyclamen Flowers

For March I chose to try out the Cyclamen origami flowers from my book "Origami Flowers: Popular Blossoms and Creative Bouquets".

The cyclamen is a cute little flower, and I did once have a live plant - but I didn't do so well at keeping it alive. Besides that, indoor plants don't tend to live very long with indoor cats!

This flower was a little difficult to shape at the end, but they still turned out pretty cute! I do wonder if a thinner paper might work better for this flower - either way I quite like this particular origami flower.

Origami flowers I have made from this book:

January: Balloon Flower

February: Blue Star

Windmill Easter Gift

Happy Easter!

Originally for Easter this year I was planning on making the kids in our family some little bunnies - until we saw these little windmills at Kmart!

My little brother-in-law loves gardening so I thought these would be perfect. All I did was create a simple tag from cardboard to wrap around the post then I glued the two sides together and put a bunny sticker on it.

This is a quick, easy and cheap Easter gift that little and big kids will love!

Origami Blue Star Flowers

Today I was planning a post for the newest origami flower I learnt to make using my book "Origami Flowers: Popular Blossoms and Creative Bouquets" when I realised that I didn't post about the ones I learnt to make last month!

In January I tried out the Balloon flowers, and in February I opted for the Blue Star flowers.

This flower is a little awkward to make, but they turned out quite cute! I don't have the correct type of paper for the leaves, but my memo paper is great to practice origami with!

I am also doing a lot better with the floral tape, so I guess it was just me and not the tape that had issues!

If you are interested in origami flowers, keep checking back as I'm hoping to complete a new flower from this book each month of 2013!

Origami Balloon Flowers

One of many ideas I had for my wedding was to make an origami flower bouquet so I asked my dad to buy me the book "Origami Flowers: Popular Blossoms and Creative Bouquets" by Hiromi Hayashi. 

I attempted a few of the flowers, failed and promptly gave up as I just didn't have the time to work at it. After going through my boxes of books and finding this one again, I decided that I would like to work my way through this book and create all of the flowers! 

For my first flower attempt I chose the balloon flower as it looked relatively easy and only used one sheet of paper. 

So once I got the cutting of the paper correct, I found this flower to be pretty easy to do. They turned out alright which is the main thing! 

I made this rainbow bunch of origami 'get well soon' balloon flowers for my SIL. 

I didn't wrap any paper leaves into the stems, but there are templates in this book that you can trace and cut. I was having problems with my floral tape, I don't know if it was the tape or just me - either way I guess I will find out when I buy a new roll. The instructions said to use a piece of yellow floral tape for the center but I didn't have any so I just rolled strips of yellow paper around it. 

Hopefully I do this well for the next flower I choose!

German Paper Stars

I went a little overboard recently when I found a tutorial for a really cute paper star! I was orginally looking for origami Christmas ornaments when I found some instructions on how to make these German Paper Stars. The instructions I found were far to confusing but after a little more searching I found a great YouTube tutorial. I still had to pause and go back a few times but it was easy once I worked it. 

And after cutting far too many strips of paper, I now have some new ornaments to add to my tree... 

I haven't decided what to do with the little stars yet, maybe a garland for the window - I may have to make more though and I'm not sure I'm up to it anymore! 

If you are up for a paper folding/weaving challenge you really should give these stars a try. And might I suggest you don't start making them with 6mm paper strips like I did. I really don't know what I was thinking when I cut all those strips! 

I have lots more of my crafting adventures to share with you, once I get the time. You gotta love Christmas...

Glitter gift tags!

I found photos I had taken for a tutorial quite awhile ago and had forgotten to post it! 

You may have noticed in my Flickr photos that I have made quite a few glitter gift tags and cards. They are really quite easy to do so I thought I would share how I do it. 

Materials:

A stencil (or you can freehand your image)
A skewer and/or toothpicks
Glitter
PVA glue
Blank card

1. Gather your supplies!
2. I chose to use a shell stencil for this gift tag so just line it up where you want the picture to be - think ahead of where you will be writing.
3. Because we are using glitter we don't want to see pen or pencil marks where we outline our image. Use your skewer just like a pen and create an indented outline in the card.
4. As you can see it is a little difficult to see the outlines but it looks much better when finished.
5. Using a skewer or toothpick start filling one section of your image with pva.
6. Once it starts to dry around the edges you will need to glitter that section and move onto the next.
7. You can carefully complete sections next to already glittered parts - it is better if you can do each section in one go.
8. Once you are finished leave the pile of glitter on top until you are sure it is dry.
9. Tap off the excess glitter and your glittered tag is ready!

Unfortunately my husband put something on top of mine while it was drying. All I was worried about was the cat jumping on it - I know better now. 

Go ahead and make your own cute gift tags using glitter!

Using a section of a stamp

If you have been following my Create for 365 days photos on Flickr you may have noticed a lot of gifts tags, mini cards and bookmarks that I have made.

I thought I would share the easiest way to make personalised cards and other papercrafts.

When I was little my parents gave me a plastic briefcase stamp kit that had 120 stamps in it, add that to all the other stamps I already had and have occasionally bought and carved myself and there is a reason I have a box of stamps that are hardly used.

As a teenager I used them to decorate my school diary which I would then colour in during boring classes...

I have alphabet and number stamps that feature animals - eg. P for panda. So while the stamps are cute I found that generally I would like to use the animal part of the stamp but don't want to use the letter or number part.

Would you believe there is an easy fix for that?

Original stamp -- butterfly only -- butterfly in colour

All I do is take either a texta or a gel pen and ink up the part of the stamp I want to use. You have to be quick so the ink doesn't dry but it works.

And once you know that you can prepare the stamp quick enough, you can try out coloured stamping.

It is easier to use textas for bigger stamps with large surface areas to cover, but for most of my stamps I just use gel pens.

Any parts that don't stamp clearly are easily touched up using your gel pen.

Once the ink is dry I simply colour in the stamp using gel pens or water colour pencils.

Hopefully now you are able to see more options in your stamps!