Creative Touches With FREE Fonts

I am all about the free...especially since paper crafting is such an expensive hobby!

My wonderful husband surprised me with a Cricut for Christmas. Needless to say, I have been glued to my computer the past several days trying to find low cost & free ways to make my creations shine.

Thanks goodness for free fonts! My two favorite websites are www.dafont.com and www.fontquirrel.com. Both sites have fonts that you simply download with the click of a button - when you open a new document in Word, they are there for your use!

Fonts are great - instead of spending needless money on a bunch of stamps for your cards, simply design sentiments or monograms & either print them directly onto the base card before embellishing it or print them onto the paper of your choice then cut them out using a pretty shape & the center point feature on your Cricut machine. Voila! Cheap & elegant embellishments!

Stuck for an idea for you sentiment? Visit www.brainyquote.com or www.quotegarden.com. Both sites have quotes searchable by category (friendship, love, sympathy, etc.).

Spa Party

I threw a spa party for my daughter's 9th birthday. I know some of these aren't paper crafts, but it really was a lot of fun to do, so I thought I'd share everything with you.

The first thing I did was set the mood with these cute invitations. These are sleep masks that I made by printing the details on white card stock, then cutting them out & gluing them to a piece of pretty scrapbook paper. I outlined the front with blue ribbon. I made each girl's name on a Cricut & added a flower & gem detail (also made on a Cricut). If you don't have a Cricut, this step is not necessary. You don't need it to make the main body of the invite. Finally, I punched holes to the sides & added blue ribbon ties. I think they turned out really cute!

 

 

I packaged the invites in a cello bag & added a set of cute toe spacers. I sealed the bag with a glue dot & another Cricut made flower, but you can use stickers if you like.

 

 

The girls were greeted by a welcome sign & fresh scented candle. The sign was just letters cut on a Cricut & glued to a 12 x 12 piece of scrapbook paper. I propped it on a large plate stand in my entry.

 

 

There was a table set with personalized goody bags & spa water. The goody bags were filled with nail polish, lip gloss & a loofah. The girls made crafts at the party to add to the bags.

 

The spa water is simply mini bottles of water wrapped with colorful duct tape.

 

 

The first activity was a table set with a bucket of white flip flops & a basket of ribbon cut to 6" lengths. The girls made their own spa sandals by tying the ribbon to the flip flops.

Didn't they turn out pretty?

 

Next, the girls were treated to facials & manicures.

 

The facial basket was filled with face mask, hair towels (which went into the goody bags at the end of the party), a spray bottle of water & cotton pads for cleaning. There was also a sheet of face jewels for them to apply after their facials.

 

The nail bucket had polish, files, lotion, cuticle sticks, polish remover & cotton pads.

 



 

After facials, the girls moved to the kitchen where they made their own Peppermint Candy Sugar Scrub, Rosemary Lavender Bath Salts & Lavender Green Tea Facial Toner. All of the recipes are readily available on the Internet. I got mine from Pinterest. I bought the 8 oz mason jars at the groccery store for $8 a dozen. I laid out baskets with precut material for the jar tops & homemade tags to tie around the jars.

 

Here's the dipped marshmallows I made. The base that they are in is styrofoam outlined with the same duct tape as the water bottles. I wrapped plain candy sticks with Washi Tape to make them colorful. There are strawberry & plain marshmallows dipped in blue & yellow candy melts & covered with sugar sprinkles.

 

 

I LOVE how my face maks cheese ball turned out! Again, Pinterest!

 

My daughter is not a cake eater, but she loves cupcakes, so I made 2 dozen & set them out with jars of frosting & a tray of candy so each girl could decorate her own. The cups are plastic shot glasses from Walmart!

 

That's about it! I hope I've inspired you to explore your inner Diva!

Girly Birthday Card - Green & Black

Here's the card I made for my Mom's birthday. This one was incredibly easy & required no special supplies. I used premade cards from Hobby Lobby, scrapbook paper, glitter, & scrapbook embellishments...simple yet beautiful!

The paper I used inside the card was the reverse of the paper on the outside, so it matched perfectly.

Amazing what you can do with some stick on gems & glitter glue!

Little Girl Cupcake Birthday Card

I made this card for my daughter's 9th birthday using Copic Pens & glitter paper.

The cupcake was done with a set I purchased from Krazy Kreations. There is a video on our blog under the Copic Markers post (see below).

You will need the following supplies:

Glitter Paper Starter Set

Elizabeth Craft Stickers

Copic Markers (refer to our blog post Copic Markers for color & shading demos)

I have found that a cutting mat & Xacto knife work well for cutting close on finely detailed items. Just a little tip!

Once you create your glitter accessory, attach it to a card with adhesive foam squares to make it pop up. I use plain white premade cards from Hobby Lobby. They're easy to dress up with scrapbook paper. The yellow strip is cut from plain scrapbook paper that I edged with those decorative scissors you can get in the scrapbook aisle of any craft store. The "Happy Birthday" is stamped with a glue pad then covered in ultrafine semitransparent glitter from Sparkle & Sprinkle. The number 9 & the flower accent are cut from the Wild Things cartridge on a Cricut & attached with foam squares & a small rhinestone accent. The dots on the 9 are done with  a Stickles.

I embellished the envelope with my favorite Washi Tape & cotton twine technique - a homemade flag banner - and my daughter's name cut from a Cricut & accented with a Stickles. I also made another Cricut flower.

You gotta love Pinterest!

Pinterest is addicting! I was looking for a unique gift for everyone for Thanksgiving. I settled on homemade Pumpkin Spice Sugar Scrub for the girls & Rosemary Mint Shaving Cream for the guys. Both were super easy & a big hit.

My only changes were: sugar scrub - double the spices or you won't smell it; shaving cream - I substituted vegetable oil for the jojoba oil - MUCH cheaper!

Notes: I bought my 8 oz mason jars at Winco for about $8 a dozen. I got the coconut oil at Super Wal Mart for $6 for 32 oz.

The tags were made on MS Word. I just did 2 tag shapes - one slightly smaller than the other - & typed in the text. I cut the tags out, applied the smaller one on top of the larger one with a foam tape square, then punched a hole in the end. I tied the tags to the mason jars with raffia, using cinnamon sticks & ornamental rosemary as embellishments. The jar lids are covered with a piece of paper that I cut out using the lid as a guide.

Halloween Project & Cricut

I made this haunted house using Cricut cartridge Happy Hauntings & only 2 colors of paper - black & yellow. It took a total of about 5 hours to cut & assemble. I embellished it a bit with brads & gave it an overall spray of glitter. Turned out pretty cute!

Bird Birthday Card

Here's a birthday card made with Copic pens & glitter paper. Please excuse the blurriness - my camera phone isn't the best.

The bird & leaves were done with a set I purchased from Krazy Kreations at the Ontario expo this fall. You basically make your own glitter paper...sounds hard but it's really easy. There is an excellent tutorial below that takes you from start to finish. The only difference is that I put the clear transparent sheet onto plain white cardstock to make white glitter paper, rather than having a transparent image.

You will need the following supplies:

Glitter Paper Starter Set

Elizabeth Craft Stickers

Copic Markers (refer to our blog post Copic Markers for color & shading demos)

I have found that a cutting mat & Xacto knife work well for cutting close on finely detailed items. Just a little tip!

Once you create your glitter accessories, attach them to a card with adhesive foam squares to make them pop up. I use plain white premade cards from Hobby Lobby. They're easy to dress up with scrapbook paper. The branch was free-form cut from  a piece of brown paper. The "Happy Birthday" is written in The Rubber Cafe's Scrap Happy Glue with an ultra fine tip, then covered in ultrafine semitransparent glitter from Sparkle & Sprinkle.

Here's that video I promised...

Girly Birthday Card

Here are some pictures of a card I made for my girlfriend's 40th birthday.

 

This is the outside of the card. I trimmed off the bottom inch or so of the card so that the top flap is shorted than the other one. I attached a twinkle border from Queen & Co. to the bottom inside of the card - see how it shows on the outside!

 

I trimmed a piece of background paper & taped it to the front flap. The blue swish is a piece of plain cardstock taped over the background paper. The "Bernadette" was done with rub on letters. The round seal is 2 pieces. The bottom scalloped piece was punched from a piece of cardstock using a Martha Stewart 1" Scalloped Circle Punch. I glued a pre-printed decorative paper disc that I had on top of that. You can make one yourself or buy one. I took the finished seal & attached it to the left side of the blue swish with a foam square adhesive to make it pop up a little. The gems on the right are just stick-on Goosebumps.The front of the finished card was given a quick spray of glitter from a can.

The inside of the card is simply "Happy Birthday" written in The Rubber Cafe's Scrap Happy Glue with an ultra fine tip, then covered in ultrafine semitransparent glitter from  Sparkle & Sprinkle.

For the envelope, I made my own birthday banner with Washi Tape & cotton twine. Simply fold a strip of tape over the twine so that it sticks to itself. Trim the ends up however you like...some people do triangle pennants, I did notched flags. Use mini glue dots to attach each end of the twine to the outside of your envelope & voila! I wrote "Happy Birthday" with a Stickles.

Washi Tape

So my new favorite thing is Washi Tape. Not familiar with it? It's paper tape that is printed with pretty patterns. There are SO many uses for it...home decor, crafts, scrapbooking, jewelry, etc. It's amazing! Just Google "washi tape" you'll be amazed at what comes up.

My daughter has a spa-themed birthday party coming up, so I think I'm going to try these Washi Tape utensils (paisleypetalevents.com) & treat pops (ucreateparties.com).

I've already done that birthday banner (Precious Paper blog) for a card & it was amazing. Get yourself some Washi Tape & start creating!

Rubber Stamping With Glitter

One of the coolest techniques we have seen is useing rubber stamps with glue instead of ink. Once the image is stamped, you can embellish with ultrafine glitter for a truly beautiful creation.

Some things you'll need are:

• ScrapHappy Sheer Glue from The Rubber Cafe
• Stamp foam or finger tip pads for applying the glue to the stamp. These can be purchased at Hobby Lobby or from the Rubber Cafe.
• Rubber Stamps
• Ultrafine Glitter - we bought ours from Sparkle N Sprinkle
• Tape lint roller

 This video shows you many uses for the ScrapHappy Sheer Glue. Scroll forward about 9 1/2 minutes for the tutorial specifically about glitter & glue stamping.

Visit The Rubber Cafe at www.therubbercafe.com. Visit Sparkle N Sprinkle at www.sparklensprinkle.com.

Copic Markers

If you've never used Copic Markers, you're missing out. These cool little pens have an alcohol based ink that is perfect for blending. They feature replaceable nibs & refillable ink. On the flip side, they are pricey - averaging about $5 per pen. Where do you start? With 300 color choices, how do you maximize your purchase? We're here to help! This is a list of 12 basic Copic Markers that will allow you to achieve many color combinations.

YG01
G99
Y19
R35
BG11
BG49
BV08
V0000
R59
E18
E51
RV29

Remember, with Copic Markers, start with the lighter color, then use the darker one to add shading, and end by blending with the lighter color you started with. Stay within the same color family. Paper Craft Planet has a great tutorial on using Copics to color on glitter paper. The results are amazing!

 

Here's a quick refernce to help you choose the correct pens for specific color combos:

 

Green = YG01 + G99

Orange = Y19 + R35

Aqua = BG11 + BG49

Purple = BV08 + V0000

Burgundy = R59 + V0000

Brown = E18 + E51

Pink = RV29 + V000

 

Send us your favorite combos - we'd love to share them.

 

So, where do you find Copic Markers? Any of the big scrapping suppliers sell them. We got ours from www.krazykreationsstudio.com.  You can also find a retailer near you at www.copicmarker.com/dealer-locator.

Scrapbook Expo - Disneyland for Scrappers

So, we attended our first Scrapbook Expo in Ontario, CA this past weekend. Whew! By the end of each day our bodies ached & our brains felt like they were going to explode from product overload. With so many booths to visit & classes to take, here are some tips we felt were worth passing along:

1. Plan to attend at least two days. We found that the hour-long classes & product demos took up a lot more time than we imagined. We almost felt rushed on our last day trying to hit all of the booths that we wanted to see.
2. Have a game plan. Go online well before the event. Look at the list of vendors & visit their websites to see what they offer. Print a map of the expo & make notes - highlight your "must see" booths, cross of the definite skips.
3. Print the online coupons before you go.
4. Bring a large tote bag, note pad & pen. Skip the purse - put your wallet & cell phone in your tote. You'll thank us later. Also, bring a big bottle of water unless you don't mind being gouged $3 for one there.
5. Don't buy ANYTHING on your first pass. Keep that notebook handy. Make notes as you see things you want with booth name, item & price. This is especially true if you plan to attend classes. You walk away from the classes with samples & coupons. Take the first night to look over your notes, organize coupons, review prices & create a wish list for the next day.
6. Skip the card making classes - there was very little instruction. Basically, you pay $34 for a pre-cut pack of supplies to assemble 8 cards that you probably won't even use because you won't have time to finish them & they aren't even that cute. If you're a beginner, you'll get frustrated quickly with the fast pace & lack of direction.
7. The trunk shows rock - you pay to get a product review & walk away with tons of supplies worth more than you paid to attend the class. Our favorite was Queen & Co. We paid $30 & walked away with over $60 in product!
8. Ask a lot of questions. When you're doling out tons of money on craft supplies, be sure you know how to use them when you get home. Take notes. The booth workers are more than happy to demo their wares for you & answer any questions.
9. Take your camera phone or a small camera. We snapped countless pictures of sample cards & page layouts. You will never remember how to use some of the stuff you come home with unless you do this. There are countless ways to use tape - who knew?
10. Skip the Make & Takes - they're basically $3-$5 product demos. You'll waste a lot of valuable shopping time doing something you can do at home.

Enjoy the expo. They are truly a ton of fun & very informational. We're looking forward to the next one in Anaheim in January. For the Scrapbook Expo near you, visit www.scrapbookexpo.com. Happy Scrapping!