Craft

September 10, 2013

Paper craft demonstration

Remember I told you about Craft Hack? (Yeah, I know you’re nodding while surreptitiously checking the link. I’ll refresh your memory.) It’s a monthly artist and crafter gathering. We chat and work on whatever craft projects we have in progress. Plus, each time there’s a different craft demo for anyone who wants to try something new.

Well, this time, I’m the demo-er. Demo-ista? Demotante?

Anyway. I’ll be demonstrating a few paper crafting techniques, while we pimp out paper sacks into holiday-worthy gift bags.

Should be fun times! Stop on by Gangplank Chandler for tomorrow’s Craft Hack, if you’re in town. Otherwise, I’ll be posting about it here later on.

August 28, 2013October 30, 2020

How to press flowers while traveling

Pressing wildflowers is a great way to remember the landscape you’ve traveled. You create a simple souvenir, a keepsake with more dimension than a photo.

Before you go/materials list:

1. Find a book you don’t mind destroying. You can use an outdated catalog or phone book, but just make sure it’s not too bulky to pack! This will be your portable flower press.

2. Find a rubber band that will fit around the book to keep it shut or several clips (or clothespins) that can hold a group of pages together.

On the road:

3. Look for leaves or “flatter” flowers with fewer layers (think daisies over roses) along the road, trails, or other places you visit. Pick a one or two or a few. Note where you found it/them or take a photo of the spot, so you can remember later. You may want to pick a flower for each day of your trip. After you pick one, I’d recommend doing a quick check for bugs. And, of course, don’t go picking on plants where it’s prohibited, like National Parks or people’s gardens.

4. Set the flower on top of one of your book pages. (If you’re picking one each day, you can press the first day’s flower in Chapter One, the second day’s in Chapter Two, etc. Or just make a note on whichever page you press the flower on.) Carefully close the book over the flower, so it’s positioned the way you want it to be pressed. You can put a few flowers on a page, but don’t put them on adjacent pages.

5. Band the book or clip a handful of pages around the flower to keep anything from falling out. Stick the book under your luggage, in between large items in your pack, or wherever you can put the most pressure on it.

6. If you add more flowers, place them in a different part of the book, so you aren’t moving the first one and are allowing additional pressure/weight between them. (Again, starting near the front and working your way back might be helpful.) Also, you want plenty of pages in between to absorb any moisture the flowers release while drying.

7. Give them a few weeks. When ready, flowers will be thin, dry and papery. If you get home before they’re ready, stick the book at the bottom of a stack of books or some heavy object that you won’t be moving around. Just don’t forget about them!

8. Pressed flowers and leaves would be a beautiful addition to your trip scrapbook or framed with your travel photos! They’ll be pretty fragile, so you may want to put behind glass, slip into plastic sleeves, or cover with contact paper.

July 8, 2013May 23, 2023

Craft Hack and mini envelopes

We stayed in town for the Fourth of July, which was a good thing for us, because our friends Bryan and Joanna made us a wonderful brunch. And it’s a good thing for you, because this blog has been a little heavy on the travel and light on the craft, and it’s time to balance things out a bit more.

So the first craft-related thing I wanted to tell you about is Craft Hack. I mentioned going to Craft Hack when I had my journal fail (I do want to follow up on that, since I ended up finding a journal-making solution that I think turned out pretty well.) Basically, Craft Hack is a time for people to get together, work on and show off their art and craft projects. If you aren’t working on anything currently, every month there’s a demonstration, and you can try that out.

It will be this Wednesday (and the second Wednesday of every month) at Gangplank Chandler at 6pm. You can get more details on the Craft Hack East Valley Facebook page.

I also created a flyer, using this envelope template and modifying it a little. You can print off the flyer, get the info, and then fold it into a little envelope for your business cards or to tuck into a scrapbook for small mementos of your summer travels (a presssed blossom? coins? ticket stubs?).

We handed these out last month when Craft Hack had a booth at the Chandler Art Walk (which has moved to different indoor locations to avoid the summer heat). I wish I could have stuck around longer and explored the other booths a bit more. It looks like there was some great stuff there! I’ll have to go another time, when I’m not getting ready for a camping trip the next day.

If you want to make your own envelopes, here is the envelope template I used for the flyer. I scaled it down quite a bit from the original 3″ x 6″ size, so that we could fit 2 on a standard 8.5″ x 11″ sheet of paper. And also because the mini-envelopes are so stinkin’ cute!

I also came across this page with a ton of other envelope templates and tutorials. That could keep us all busy for awhile!

June 13, 2013July 5, 2013

Craft fail

I had some grand plans for journal making this week.

It started when I saw a contest on designlovefest where you choose one of their Make It projects, and, well, make it, and then Instagram it.

As I was looking through their posts (which, yes, requires opening like 20 tabs – I need to have all the information in front of me), I came across this simple but really cool looking journal project. I was really excited. I would make one for myself. I would make some for gifts. I would become a journal-making MACHINE! Not only would I Instagram it, I would blog about it. If I won, the journals I gave as gifts would be that much more awesome, because I could be like “Happy [insert occasion here]! Here’s an award-winning journal for you.” Sweet, right?

But I needed to get this blog launched first. Even though the first post went up earlier, I wasn’t really done messing with the site and ready to announce it to the world until this week. And then the last couple days life in general did not go as planned, and, on top of the stress that had come up (or maybe because of it), I haven’t been sleeping well. By the time I went to join the crafters at CraftHack last night, I was hoping to have my journal(s) done and contest entry posted, but I had barely started.

So I brought along my paper and various cutting implements with me, so I could continue to fold, cut, and interweave the signatures.

My Craft Hack buddies had very kindly announced my new blog on Facebook. But I got the impression that a couple of the Craft Hackers mistook the “journal” in “Travelcraft Journal” to mean that I knew things about making journals. That was not my intent, which probably became increasingly evident as I was fumbling my way through a really basic one.

As it turns out, I am not a journal-making machine.

Maybe it was the wrong paper, wrong method, my inability to cut straight. It wasn’t coming together well. It wasn’t even laying flat. I clipped the pages together and laid it under a copy of 501 Spanish Verbs.

Lo dejé allí, me dormí (pues, intentía a dormir), y regresé el próximo día.*

It still didn’t lay flat.

I thought about working on it tonight, but tonight’s priority was actually to rest, to try to wind down, so I could get a good night’s sleep and get back on schedule. I looked at that journal and decided I wasn’t up for the task. I wasn’t going to make the contest deadline. And I might need to come up with some new gift ideas.

But there’s enough stress in life without worrying about a craft project that isn’t coming together right. This should be fun. Since it’s not, I’m putting it aside for now and hoping that putting this all on (virtual) paper helps my mind to rest. Maybe another day it will work out better and turnout more enjoyable. Maybe I’ll even turn into a journal-making machine.

So how about you? Any big craft fails lately? Or sleep fails?

*”I left it there, went to sleep and came back the next day.” Or at least that’s what I meant for it to say. My Spanish is rusty, and I didn’t actually consult the book.

June 4, 2013June 8, 2013

Confession

Is it too early for a confession? I realize this is only post #2 of the Travelcraft Journal project, and we’re still getting to know each other. But let’s build this thing on honesty.

Before anyone gets the idea that I’m some sort of crafting goddess (you were thinking that, right? anyone? Bueller?), I should set the record straight on something. I’ve never finished an entire scrapbook or travel journal. Photos stuck into album sleeves, sure. But that’s it.

Yep. I know. Shocking.

I’ve done scrapbooky things – made pages, sketched layouts, obsessively kept ticket stubs and other bits and pieces that should totally go into a scrapbook. But completing an entire book? That hasn’t happened. (Yet.)

scrapbooking paper covering table — This is not a mess. It’s a process. Somewhere here is the color of my trip. I just need to spread everything out so I can find it.

One thing that’s gotten me closer, though, is not waiting until I’m back from a trip to start scrapbooking. I take along some cardstock, nice pens, and a glue stick or double-sided tape, and get a jump start on journaling and putting those little bits and pieces together, while we’re still on the road.

Now, I’ve seen Smash books and other scrapbooks you fill in as you go. Love the idea, but – maybe it’s the designer in me (or the perfectionist) – I’m really into picking out paper colors that match my day, choosing the format, and all that good stuff. (That design control freakiness probably doesn’t help with the whole not-getting-the-scrapbook-done thing either.)

I thought this was an original idea until I checked with Google.

Me: Best idea evar! Scrapbooking As You Go! Bet I’m the first person this has ever occurred to, right?!

Google: Nope. There are 5 people doing exactly that on Page One alone. Plus 30,096 other things that are vaguely related that you should definitely know about.

Me: Oh. I guess I’m not as original as I thought. I should still totally buy the domain name for scrapbookasyougo.com, though, right?

Namecheap: Absolutely.

Ok, that just got real geeky real fast. Anyway. Even though other people did independently come up with the idea, I still embraced it. In fact, the whole concept of Scrapbooking As You Go was a big part of last year’s craft blog idea. I was planning to launch it right before our Epic California Roadtrip, and document the process of scrapbooking about the trip during the trip. (Uber meta.)

While I did scrapbook during (and after) the trip, I still haven’t gotten the whole thing finished. And I only published one post on the craft blog.

But I held onto the question of how to bring what you enjoy doing into your busy life, and that’s a big part of this project.

Now I just need to finish a scrapbook. Maybe I should just start making them smaller.