First Drafts

Yes!  I am still alive.  And by this point I am sure I have lost the 1 or 2 return readers that this blog may or may not have had...
I stole a few minutes this weekend to do some crafting, and started drafting some invites for the kids craft bday party i have been hired to do in May.
I thought I would share my first drafts of the invites...

Craft Party Inspirations

As mentioned here, in November I hosted (along with some help from my mom and a few other good friends) a christmas craft party.  The people attending the party came and purchased a package for $8, and this package, along with everything else supplied at the party allowed people to make pretty much as many gift tags and envelopes as they could make in an evening, for their Christmas wrapping.
So one of the people attending the party has since contacted me about throwing a similar party for her daughter's 12th birthday which is coming up in May, along with making the invitations for the party.

So as soon as I agreed, the wheels started turning and I began brainstorming about all the things I could do for the inviations, the kits for this party, and the samples I would make for things that the girls attending the party could make.  I started a new Pinterest Board to start collecting my ideas.

I thought I would share some of the inspirations I have found, in terms of creating invitations.  I am loving the idea of glassine envelopes, and some sort of paper confetti to go along with the invitation.  Seriously, how many twelve-year-old girls wouldn't like to get a little envelope full of sparkly hearts??

Pic Found Here

Pic Found Here

Pic Found Here



Pic Found Here

 So I have yet to come across exactly what I am picturing in my head, but this is a start anyways.

Back in Action

So the Christmas season didn't completely pass without any crafting.  I did manage to sneak in an hour or two last week to make a few treats for my coworkers.  I used the exact same method as here when I made
favors for my parent's anniversary party.  I filled the little bags with Christmas Hersheys Kisses.  Yum.

Construction Details

So I was making another ribbon box this weekend (to sell this time) and so I snapped a few pics of what I was doing.  I just start out with a photo storage box, from Michaels.  They put them on sale all the time, and recently were 5/$10.  Paired with a 25% off coupon, they became pretty darn cheap! 
I figured out how many ribbons I wanted to store in the box, and did a bit of math to figure out how far apart to place my holes, and began punching.  After some trial and error I also decided that it is easier to punch one hole and measure the next to make sure I am on the right track.

 Once all the holes were punched on both sides I took some large eyelets, and set on in each hole, to give it a more finished look, and also to extend the life of the box.  I figure this way the cardboard wont get worn out by having ribbons pulled through all the time.

 Lastly, I had bought a long 1.25" dowel from Home Depot a few weeks ago while I was there trying to find parts for my broken kitchen sink.  I had it chopped up into pieces that fit perfectly inside the box.

 And thats it.  And it will be wrapped up and put under someone's Christmas Tree this year.

What I have been working on

Tags.
Lots and lots of Christmas tags, hopefully to sell, but more info on that later.

What Gets Made At A Tag Party

Well...tags.  Obviously.
I was so tired from party planning and setup that by the time the party started i was feeling a bit burnt out.  Also I had figured I would be spending a fair bit of my time helping people make things, and explain things.
But, after dragging my butt into bed after midnight on Saturday night (crafting is serious business), I woke up on Sunday morning and had a peek in my little brown lunch bag to see what I had made.
And there were some really cute tags.

Now I just need to get through my exam on Thursday night, and I can go and make some more tags :)

Tag Party Package

So when I uploaded these pictures all I could think was that they a) looked terrible because my camera sucks and my photo skill are sub-par and b) didn't even begin to do justice to the amount of thought and work that I have put into these packages.  So I immediately felt like this post, which in my mind was going to be fantastic, is actually going to be pretty lame, but I will do my best.  

What makes up a tag party package, I am sure you have been dying to know...and now I will tell you all my secrets.  Each kit will come in a large plastic bag, (why my family own rolls and rolls of these clear plastic phone book bags is a story for another day) and will also contain a small kraft paper lunch bag, which holds all the goodies, plus will be a way for people to take their finished products home.

I already mentioned these little kraft bags and what inspired them here, and so this is just another shot of how they turned out.  The tag will have the receiver's name on them, and I also hope to attach a little list of everything that is found in their kits behind the tag.  We will see if time permits.

Each kit gets 4 full sheets of 12x12 scrapbook paper, approx. 10 6x12 sheets of paper, and 8 4x4 squares of paper.  The 6x12 sheets are fancy, and pretty and fun.  I had also given a preview shot here of what the process of splitting up the paper looked like.  I wanted to try and package the paper up according to people's age, taste and personality as best I could.  So I layed out post-it notes with people's name on them, and went from there. 

Probably the most painstaking part of the process was creating all the templates for people's kits.  A lot of the stuff we will be doing at the party requires punches and tools that I own, and will be shared at the party but I wanted to give them a few tools that they could keep using at home.  I guess the templates could probably get their own post sometime in the future so that I can show you which templates I chose to include.  Two of them were inspired by this pic that I found on Pinterest:

original souce found here

I went to Staples and found these durable plastic binder dividers that you can actually write on with ball point pen, so I simply traced all five templates that I wanted to include and then cut them out.  (HA!  I like how I say 'simply', but when you are providing 5 templates for 16 kits that equals 80 templates!!!  I had some severe hand cramps going on during the cutting process).

And last but definitely not least is the little bag of goodies included (and the worst picture of them all).  Desktop lamp + shiny plastic bag + point-and-shoot Canon = crappy crappy photo.
But anyways, each kit contains about 35 eyelets, some brads, adhesive jewels, 'Merry Christmas' stickers and 3D adhesive dots. 

And so there you have it - the anatomy of a tag party package.  Included in the party fee is also all adhesives, fancy ribbon and embelishments, buttons, and ribbon to string on the tags.  Not bad for $8!  I wish i got invited to a party like this!

Tag Party Kits

So I was puzzling over how to present everyone with their purchased materials at the upcoming tag party when I was instantly inspired by this pin on Pinterest, and knew what to do.

This is what my prototype ended up looking like (and yes I am studying hard in the background):

I didn't want the strings to fall out once people untied them, so I had the idea to punch two tiny holes in the back, that didn't go through to the front of the bag, and wove the string through, which will hopefully keep it attached.  As always, more details to follow when more of the party goodies are complete.

Planning Party #2

So now that party #1 is finished, planning party #2 begins.
Here is a quick snapshot of what it looks like to try and make 16 Christmas tag Party Packages:
I will give a party package anatomy breakdown later :)

Getting Your Ribbons In A Row

So I don't actually have a picture of what all my ribbon collection looked like before I did anything about it, but I am sure it looked the same as everyone else's.  A mess.  Shoved in a box, with all the loose ends taped down to avoid a bigger mess.  So I was sitting around with my mom one day, after a craft run to Michaels and Jo-Anns, and we were looking at her recently purchased photo boxes and ribbon.  And we started thinking about how to store the ribbon in one of the boxes.  So I asked my dad if it would be possible to drill holes in the box, but then realised I could just punch holes.  And so we punched one, and added an eyelet, and it looked so good that we added a bunch more holes, and a bunch more eyelets, measuring to make sure they lined up evenly across the box.

My dad was watching us, and chimed in that we needed some sort of divider running down the middle of the box, measured the box, left the room, and came back with a piece of dowel that fit perfectly down the middle of the box.

And So Voila!  Our Ribbon Storage Box was born!

 

Little Partay Favors

I posted a little preview pic last week to show off the favors I was working on for my parent's anniversary party, and here is a follow up about how I made them.

I went out and bought a few bags of Hershey mini bars, which I think are being discontinued, btw.  I chose them because I thought they would be perfect for coving up with scrapbook paper in the colors that we chose for the party.
I also went to a dollar store nearby, and bought a bag of mini ziploc bags (3"x5" I believe).

I then took them to the paper cutter, and chopped off all the ziploc parts at the top, leaving open bags.  Btw, don't ever buy these bags at the dollar store if you actually need to use the ziploc part...soo crappy, i couldn't even get them open if I tried, without wrecking the bags.

 I measured the bag width (3") and then determined how tall I wanted my toppers to be (1.5") and created a 3"x3" square in MS Word.  I added text, and flipped the 'Thank You' upside down.  I printed 8 per page on some cardstock, and then folded in half, leaving me with a 3"x1.5" topper.  I used my heart-shaped punch to add the heart to one side.  I had to improvise a little bit here, because I had wanted the hearts to be facing upwards and not sideways, but didn't plan for that very well because it wasn't possible with the punch I have.  Anyways...the sideways hearts ended up looking really cute.

 Next I put three bars in each little chopped up ziploc bag, making sure they were all lined up properly.  I also lined up the bars by type so that each bag had 3 different types of bar (I am OCD like that).

 Next up, I cut little strips of colored paper to show up behind the heart shape I punched out.  (Forgot to take pics of that, but they were just little rectangles...).  I then stapled everything together in the following order:
1.  Open topper, 2. bag with chocolates inside, 3.  Rectangular colored cardstock.
It is a bit finicky to hold everyting perfectly still while trying to staple, so after fidgeting with one or two I got smart and held the bag to the cardstock with a bit of double-sided tape.

I then put a few pieces of double sided tape down before closing the topper.  This ensured that it stayed closed properly.  Once they were in place I just pressed the topper down to tape shut.

 And here is the final product!  They are pretty cute, and pretty sturdy too.  Too bad people will be ripping them open and eating them in a few days.

Party Planning Mayhem

So for some unknown reason I thought it would be a good idea to sign up for three online courses between July and Febraury, and then to decide to throw two parties in between. 
Temporary insanity...I think so.  Keep in mind that I decided all of this while floating around on an air mattress in a swimming pool.
It doesn't seem like such a good idea now...things are a bit crazy.

Anyways, I just thought I would give a sneak peak of one of my little party-related DIY projects.  More details to come later...