More Kirigami Fun

Folding Trees offers a review of Easy Cut Pop Up Cards, a line of pop up card designs advertised as making kirigami simple to do.  I think this card is super cute!

DIY Drink Pouch to Pencil Case

I thought this tutorial on turning a drink pouch into a pencil case was a cute idea. (via Craftzine)

More Painting

So I'm in love...with acrylic painting.  I really just can't stop.  Here's the latest (the slight color variation on the sides is cuz the paint was still wet when I took it) (Oh, and the design came from a picture I saw online--not my own):

You guys don't mind if this blog becomes all about my adventures with paint, right?  Haha, no...I promise there will be other crafts coming soon.  If nothing else, I really need to make myself a paint smock soon! 

Weekend Project

This weekend, I finally started getting serious about filling in my blank walls.   This is one way I did something about covering the boring off-white:

 

  

I'd never actually painted with acrylics before, so I felt pretty pleased with myself for managing not to totally destroy any of the little canvases I had.  If you wanted to make something like this, it's easy to find these small canvases at an art store.  After that, you just have to glue ribbon to the back for a simple hanger (I was happy to get to pull out the old glue gun).

Meanwhile, I've fallen in love with painting.  I want to do more!

Guitar Hero Cake Tutorial

I want this cake.   Will you bake it for me? (via Craftzine)

Checkerboard Coasters Tutorial

I recently made these checkerboard coasters as a host gift for someone who enjoys board games. I thought they'd be fun to have out during a game night or just to liven up a dinner.

They didn't take too long to make, and it was exciting to see the materials come together. The hardest part was finding the patience for making all the squares.


Materials:

• Some underlying coaster material. I used PVC board from the art store. It's used for modeling projects. You could also use chipboard coasters or pre-made coasters but they need to be 4"x4" or able to be cut to that size for this project.
• Red and black paper
• Mod podge or some other kind of acrylic gel medium ( I used the Utrecht brand). You can choose between gloss or matte finish. I chose gloss.
• A brush for the mod podge application
• Scissors
• Pencil
• Spray fixative, available at all art stores. (I used Krylon).
  
• Utility knife (if you need to cut the coaster material to size)
• Cutting board (definitely not necessary, but I found it very helpful because it has a measured grid)

Step 1:


Grab your PVC board.

Step 2:

Cut the PVC board into 4"x4" squares with your utility knife (I made a set of 4 coasters but you can do more or fewer). I swear this is not very hard. In fact it was so easy, I forgot to take a picture at this stage. All you have to do is mark of a square with pencil, and simple keep pushing along the lines with the utility knife. It will take a few go-overs before it cuts clean, but it cuts really clean.

Step 3:

Cut 4"x4" squares out of the red paper and affix to the PVC squares with mod podge/acrylic gel medium. I actually gave myself a little extra room on the paper squares just to make sure they completely covered the coaster. It's easy to trim the edges once they are attached on.

I did a coat on the bottom of the red paper to make sure it was attached to the PVC, and then a top coat (this is the really important one), which makes the paper hard and water-resistant.

Step 4:

Cut out 1/2"x1/2" black squares. You will need 32 for each coaster (that's 128 for all 4 coasters). This was probably my least favorite part of the project. But the grid came in very handy for marking off the right sizes. (Sorry for the blurry image below).

Step 5:

Affix black squares onto coaster by putting mod podge on the back of the black squares. It helped me to look at a picture of a checkerboard to make sure that I got the pattern right (it's not that hard, but who wants to mess up at this point?)

Because cutting paper squares out is not quite an exact science, I had to be careful to check for size issues to make certain all the squares ended up fitting properly.

Don't worry about it looking exactly perfect--the homemade quality adds to the charm! Just make sure you can fit all your squares. On a couple of coasters, I ended up specially cutting out a couple of extra large or extra small squares to make up for tiny differences in square size.

Step 6:

Add mod podge over the top of all the coasters. Let them dry for an hour or two.

Step 7:

Take the coasters outside or to a well-ventilated area and spray lightly with fixative. Give them awhile to dry, and you're done!

Gift Wrap Re-Use

 Hi guys, sorry for no posts in a while.  I've been sick.  Hopefully, I'll do better this week, but I am going out of town late in the week, so I'm not making any promises.

I often find myself saving supplies (cardboard comes to mind) with no actual plan for how I can reuse these useful items for some kind of craft.   For those of you who have wrapping paper lying around for no apparent reason, I thought I'd post some ideas.

I found a few ideas via Tickled Pink:

::  Use pieces of old wrapping paper as cummerbunds around the gifts.
::  Use pieces of old wrapping paper to make a collage for new wrapping or create works of art.
::  Cut into squares and make origami.
::  Put it through a paper shredder for stuffing other gift bags and gifts going in the mail.
::  Decoupage it onto cardboard or wooden shapes to make decorations.
::  Use it as a mat for picture frames.

A few more thoughts:

::  Instead of using it as just a mat for picture frames, you could actually just use especially pretty wrapping paper as a picture itself.
::  Use it to make kirigami flowers
::  Add it to some blank card stock and make pretty greeting cards


Good luck!