Saturday, June 14, 2008

Making your letter stickers go further

Since gas prices have been going up up up, my already small scrapbook supply budget has gone down down down! I've been trying to make my supplies stretch further and I came up with a cool idea today.

Something I use a lot of is letter stickers for titles, especially American Crafts thickers. I was looking at some of my half empty sheets today and noticing that when a sticker is peeled off, there is still a little outline of the letter on the backing sheet. I thought about cutting that out and using it on my page, but unless I always want to use white lettering that's kinda boring. So, I came up with an idea!

To do this, you will need:



(o) The backing sheet from your letter stickers
(o) Small scissors (I use cutter bee) or a craft knife, whichever works best for you for cutting detailed areas
(o) Loose glitter or flock. I have even used loose eyeshadow or crushed up powdered eyeshadow to do this. (I was/am a makeup artist so I have alot of eyeshadow sitting around that I need to use up). The loose glitter shown in my photo and used on the letters is from the dollar store and cost me $1 for 5 colors!
(o) Glue. A glue pen will work, or for an even cheaper alternative use white elmer's glue and a small paintbrush.
(o) A nail file or sandpaper.
(o) I forgot to put this in the photo, but an embossing tool or ballpoint pen with no ink left in it.



First, cut your letter out of the sheet. Next, take your pen/embossing tool and go over the outline of the letter while applying pressure. The outline is usually very faint so I find this just helps to make your outline a little bit more visible when applying the glue. Don't use a pen with ink in it or your outline will smudge once you apply the glue.

Second, gently file/sand the letter. The backing paper is smooth so the stickers can be easily peeled off and the glue doesn't like to stick to it.

Fill in your letter with glue, and then apply the loose glitter or flock. Shake off the excess. I usually blow on them a little to get the rest of the glitter that shaking doesn't remove.

Trim the white from around your letter. If your outlines were a bit shaky or you went out of the lines with the glue a little, you can fix that during this step.

Tada, your result:



If you wanted a thicker chipboard look, you could glue your letter to a piece of cardboard and then cit it out. Try a cereal box or kleenex box!

So - yay! You save that sticker backing from going into a landfill, add an extra handmade touch to your pages, and have beautiful titles in custom colors. Try printing off your titles on plain white paper using fancy fonts that you downloaded for free online and using this same trick for an even cheaper alternative to stickers!

Also - here is a layout I did today/last night. I'm going to be framing this one and giving it to my mom as a late mother's day present (on Father's day - kindof ironic lol)



And some gratuitous cuteness for the heck of it..

14 comments:

Heather Landry said...

Very cute! What a super idea! =0) I hear you on the pain at the gas pump. It's eating up my scrappy budget too. I've started altering brads to get the color I want. LOL

Anonymous said...

Hey great idea! Thanks Chelsea!

(what a super cute baby you got there!!!)

Holly said...

That's a fab idea! I'll definitely have to try it out. Thanks for the tip. :0)

Celena said...

that's an awesome idea!

Margy said...

Great idea!

Unknown said...

that is such a great idea, wow!! Im going to have to give it a try! your son is so so cute too!

Helena said...

Excellent idea, I cheat with all my expensive lettering, I don't use them lol, I trace around them unto cardstock, or ceral packets, or cardboard from big boxes or if you have being lucky enough to have a pack of paper there is usually a 12 x 12 piece of cardboard at the back to protect the paper, I have used these too!!!!

Love the idea of the glitter

What a cute photo!!!!

saner4 said...

Fabulous idea! Sounds like a project my crafty daughter would love to help mom with :)
Your little guy is adorable and I love the LO you made for your mom. (My motto is better late than never! I am still finishing up my mom's present :P )

Donna Espiritu said...

wow great idea! love it!! and your son is sooo cute!

Anne House said...

Thanks, Chelsea- awesome idea!! I posted it this week on Scrapping Cents...I know it will help others!!!

Amy said...

great idea and cutepics!

Chris said...

Three things:
1. Love the alpha tip!
2. It took me TWO years to complete a Xmas gift for my father (a x-stitched version of the firefighter's prayer). Definitely better late then never. :)
3. Adorable baby!

Okispice said...

He is just adorable. Thanks for that money-saving, super creative idea!

Anonymous said...

Great idea!!