By Julie Finn •
July 8, 2009
Do you ever think I will run out of weird stuff to do to vinyl record albums? As a crafter who works primarily with recycled materials, I find vinyl records especially inspirational: they’re rigid yet can be malleable, you can incorporate the song titles and album title into your piece or not, you can cut and drill them, you can paint them, you can do things with them that I haven’t even thought about yet, and I’ve thought about it a lot.
Although my bread-and-butter is the ubiquitous record bowl, I’ve made everything from jewelry to artwork with these babies. If only I could bring to them my love of fabrics, especially the ones in those big sample books of upholstery fabric that I bought at a charity thrift store a few months ago and have been so obsessed with…
Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!
By Julie Finn •
May 13, 2009
My girls and I tend to craft with scrapbook paper often enough that I buy it when it’s on sale, but not often enough that I tend to use up all the paper that I’ve bought. Coincidentally, I also love photography, long to display my photos more around the house, and loathe store-bought photo frames–it just seems like I’ve sold, donated, given away, or thrown out enough photo frames over my lifetime for various reasons, you know?
Here’s another stash-busting project that I’ve been working hard on this week: covering recycled cardboard with pretty stash scrapbooking paper to use as wall photo frames around the house. The benefits of these photo frames are that they’re cheap, light and easy to mount without a lot of hardware, amenable to a plethora of modifications that will allow you to match your room or express your personality, and quick to make, letting you get as quickly as possible to the point of the project: getting your beautiful artwork out there on your walls.
By Jackie Hernandez •
April 15, 2009
I am still looking for ways to transform my stash of plain boring notecards. I showed you how to use fabric scraps and stamps to “recover” the card and how to make inside out notecards with craft punches in Part 1 of this series. Now I want to show you how to make inside out notecards using your own cut out design instead of craft punches.
I just stumbled across this great little Etsy shop called Dozi. Shop owner, Wendy Chung, makes cards, calendars, paper packs, and workbooks featuring her original modern and simple designs. Dozi is Chinese for “bean”, and symbolizes Wendy’s love for the small and simple.
By Jackie Hernandez •
March 18, 2009
It is no secret that scrapbooking uses up gobs of paper. Crafting a green scrapbook is definitely an uphill battle. We’ve shown you recycled papers, handmade embellishments, even how to use leftover paint chips, and now I give you recycled kraft scrapbook paper.
Jillibean Soup offers cute, unique, eco-friendly scrapbook papers printed on 100% recycled Kraft paper. Printing their debut line on kraft paper was so important that they custom-manufactured folio size kraft paper that is acid-free and lignin free. I personally love the look of the brown kraft paper in the background.
By Jackie Hernandez •
March 17, 2009
I have a mini stockpile of tins in my craft room begging for attention. In an effort to ditch all the plastic bins for greener options, I have decided to alter the tins with decorative paper so I can use them as storage for all my crafty bits. You can use anything from Altoid tins to larger cookie or popcorn tins for this project. Around the holidays there tends to be a lot of products packaged in tin containers. I am going to use two tins from a pair of sunglasses and a watch.
When it comes to altered tins, there aren’t any rules. You can paint them, draw on them, glue stuff to them… what ever you desire. Today I wanted to share an easy tutorial for altering tins with paper to make simple decorative storage containers.
By Jackie Hernandez •
March 16, 2009
The key elements to a great scrapbook are great pictures, decorative papers, and the perfect embellishments. Finding unique handmade scrapbook embellishments is a great way to enhance your eco-friendly scrapbook. Kits and Caboodles makes an adorable selection of scrapbook embellishments using recycled and upcycled papers.
Andrea, the creative woman behind Kits and Caboodles uses a variety of paper sources to make her eco embellishments and other craft goods. She is a huge supporter of reduce, reuse, and recycle. Her creative product packiging made from found and repurposed materials is just the start.
By Julie Finn •
March 11, 2009
There really are a lot of options today for those who would like to enjoy the craft of scrapbooking without contributing to wasteful or destructive world practices. Not only are there more green scrapbooking products on the market, but there are also other products, such as archival sprays, craft punches, decorative scissors, and a wide variety of adhesives, that allow us to utilize many more recycled elements in our work than we may previously have considered.
As an example, we recently underwent a project in our house to paint our girls’ room as a rainbow (I know, I know–little girls). This entailed the collection of a variety of paint chips in rainbow colors, which were then left sitting, unwanted, after the rainbow project had reached its conclusion.
What to do? What to do?
By Julie Finn •
March 3, 2009
You have to love a two-step tutorial. I wrote a while back about how I made gift tags from greeting cards–all vintage, all from people we only hung out with, um, pre-divorce, all awesome, and it took all of about five minutes.
My other big obsession (as if I have only two!) is comic books–not just the big players, but also the less popular ones. Lately I’ve been getting really into scrapbooking, while also being completely turned off by the insane amount of consumerism embedded in this one craft (a subject of another loooooong post to come, I’m sure), and I’ve been looking for ways to both recycle and incorporate some of my less mainstream fangeek loves, like comic books, into my scrapbooking and card-making. Crafting a green scrapbook, indeed.
If you’re also into utilizing some cool paper in your work–comic books, magazines, wrapping paper, foreign language newspapers, vintage books–check out this quick and easy way (not two steps, but still quick and easy) I make sturdy gift tags and scrapbook embellishments out of flimsy comic books:
By Jackie Hernandez •
February 20, 2009
Die Cuts With A View (DCWV) has just released the Green Stack collection made from 70% post-consumer recycled paper that is also acid-free and lignin-free. The debut Green Stack paper pad features 24 woodland designs complete with squirrels, owls, and a little faux bois. The collection also includes a matching Green Stack Chipboard Set with 105 shapes and letters made from 70% post-consumer recycled paper.
The DCWV website has a great idea gallery with sample pages from each collection, like the Guess Who sample page shown here which features the Green Stack collection. Check out the other awesome Green Stack sample pages after the jump.
By Jackie Hernandez •
February 6, 2009
Use left over paper scraps to make this charming family tree perfect to tuck into a scrapbook or frame for display.
I used left over scraps I had of Amy Butler Lotus scrapbook paper, but here are 5 other great paper sources for this project. (Note: Some of these options may not be archival.)
- Upcycle greeting cards
- Use colorful magazine clippings
- Use pages from an old atlas or map (like Julie did to make her own envelopes)
- Cut up leftover paint chips
- Instead of paper use Eco-fi Felt
