How to attach vellum

Vellum used to be made from animal skins, but the papers we use today are imitation vellum, made from plasticized cotton. Vellum is a semi-translucent paper, and that quality makes it difficult to adhere to other surfaces because adhesives have a tendency to show through.

These days, you can buy a vellum adhesive tape to adhere, and other options include using brads & eyelets to attach it to your other papers. I’ve had great success using Elmer’s spray glue. Using this type, you have to spray quickly and evenly, but it dries clear. If you happen to use an adhesive that shows through, try some quick fixes, such as inking the paper where the adhesive shows through, or adding a ribbon or another trim to that space. Experiment and see what works best for you. Don;t shy away from using vellum. It adds such a beautiful quality. This card features a picture I printed on vellum.

A funny birthday card :o)

I love my Cricut, and I have quite a number of cartridges, I just don’t use them all (kind of like my collection of other scrapbooking supplies & tools lol). But anyway, the other day, I was in a mad hurry to get a birthday card off in the mail to my brother, so I picked up the Beyond Birthdays cartridge.   I kind of spaced off the fact that beside it having neat greetings, it also has a card setting. I picked out this one of a happy dude, turned out so cute!

Heehee, looks like he’s all happy, jumping up and down. I love it!

The inside: (Ok, I must admit, I was writing by hand and made a mistake, so I covered it with a little tag I whipped up quick.  Mistakes can always be fixed! So now the little guy is actually jumping on ground instead of nothingness 🙂 ) I just used a glitter pen to write the message inside.

Make your own glimmer mist

I’m a huge fan of Tim Holtz Distress Inks and I keep coming across more ways to use them! I was reading in a forum today and someone had a link to a page showing how to make glimmer mist on your own! One of the key components was Tim Holtz Distress Reinkers! Yes, I will be nice a post the link for you too lol

Make your own  glimmer mist!

Easiest way to mat a photo

If you’re a hurried scrapbooker like I often am, there’s an easy way to mat your photos. Using this way, it doesn’t really matter what the size of your photo is. Simply lay your photo down on the piece of paper you want to use for your mat. Next, if you want to be precise, you can use a ruler, but I often eyeball this part.

 Lay your photo next to a corner section of your piece of paper. Pull the photo away from the edge about 1/2″, or whatever size you want the mat to show around your picture. Keep your photo laying on the paper &  mark the other two sides with a small pencil line Remove your photo, use your paper cutter to cut those edges you marked so that you will have the same width of mat all around your photo. Unless you want to get fancy, simply use double sided tape or a photo adhesive and attach your photo to the mat!

What does it mean to mat a photo?

When you’re new to scrapbooking like I was 5 years ago, you hear all these fancy terms and have no idea what they mean. One for me back then was the term, “mat your photo”. I had a vague idea because I had seen frames with mats in before, but what did it mean in scrapbooking?

Well, I found out that matting a photo in scrapbooking just means to cut a piece of paper slightly larger than your photo. That way you can attach the photo to the mat and make it stand out more on your scrapbook page. I’m a big fan of double matting, so I cut one piece of paper slightly larger than the photo, then another paper slightly bigger than that mat.

Here is a shadow box I made for my mother-in-law. You can see that the pictures have a cream colored mat, and then below that one is a green mat. Simple, easy & enhances your pictures!

Digital scrapbooking

Digital scrapbooking is a huge hobby these days. It makes less clutter of course and can be cheaper. The embellishments come on a clear background so that they can be layered or positioned anywhere you like on your digital layout.

The first thing you need is a digital scrapbooking program. You can google this and see different user’s reviews on them. I always think it is best to try a free download before you buy so you can see if it is easy for you to understand.

There are all sorts of digital scrapbooking freebies out there, so that is another thing to google and see how they work before stocking up on all sorts of more expensive graphics. If you don’t have time for traditional scrapbooking, this would be a fun option to look into!

Make your craft flower punchies spectacular!

Did you ever buy a craft punch that you thought was pretty, but when you tried it out, it just seems sort of lame?  Take a flower punch, you punch one and it just looks blah. Well, all you need to make it look wonderful is to punch a few in 2-4 colors and preferably several sizes, add a little chalk around the edges for color, and then a great secret is to take a stylus and run it down the center of each petal. This will crease the flower petal making it more 3-D and a little more realistic.  Then layer the flower in several colors and place a fancy brad in the center. Another idea is to punch a flower in green, and cut off several of the petals to use as leaves. Simply glue two or three “leaves” to the back of your flower.  There you have it, flowers that are much better than the expensive ones at the craft store 🙂

Other uses for scrapbooking supplies

 

I’m always interested when I hear about scrapbooking supplies being used for other purposes besides scrapbooking. On a craft forum recently, I saw where someone used brads to make a piece of jewelry. One time a lady called me asking for micro brads. After a little discussion, she told me that she used them to make Braille maps for blind students! How amazing…I would have never thought of that as a use for micro brads. I guess in a way it’s like me taking hardware from Lowe’s and using those in my scrapbooks 🙂 So you have any other uses for scrapbooking embellishments that you would like to share? I’d love to hear your ideas!

Scrapbooking isn’t just for photos

Scrapbookers tend to think of scrapbooking just in terms of saving their photos and memories.  Well, it has many other uses, even in terms of getting a job! Think of graphic artists, interior designers, photographers, etc. They need to have a catalog of their works whenever they are applying for a job or whenever they have to close a deal with a potential client.

Think too of special interest clubs. I teach piano and belong to a federated music club. Since the club has been in existence in the 1940’s, the presidents and members have kept mementos such as newspaper articles, programs and such pertaining to the club. So think outside the box and see what else you can scrapbook besides just photos!

Add stickers for spice

Need a quick and easy way to finish off scrapbook pages? Try stickers! Sometimes I’ve worked on a page and there’s just something missing. That’s when I look through my sticker stash. They’re a practical tool that are inexpensive and just plain easy.

If you’re thinking now of the stickers your teacher gave you in school, that’s way off these days. Now you can get stickers that are practically works of art. Layered, sewn, beaded, glittered, even ones that allow you to store a keepsake inside! Cool huh? So come on, add a sticker or two and make your scrapbook pages stand out from the rest!