Luggage Label Art

They're small, quick to do, easy to use (in journals, cards and gifts) and will often give you a burst of inspiration for a new project or technique.

What are they?    Luggage labels!!

It doesn't have to be a polished artwork for you to list on your Etsy store every time. Creating like this simply gives you ideas for what does and doesn't work.

When you don't have much time or you've hit a creative block try grabbing a small luggage label limit your colors/papers & techniques to reduce decision making stress and see what you can come up with.

Materials used for these labels... (which you will probably have to hand in your supplies)

• Luggage tags available at craft stores or make your own.  (This is when a Cricut machine is always handy :)
• Acrylic paints (I chose 4 colors plus white)
• Stencils.  I chose three that I had in my stash.
• Butterfly images (or image of your choice) or photocopies on tracing paper.  Add some paint to the backs of the tracing paper images for a softer feel.
• Sari silk ribbon to finish (optional)

I used my fingers to randomly add paint color to four tags.  When dry added patterns with stencils in a contrasting color along one long edge of the tag.

Then add your chosen imagery.  (These butterfly images were copied on to tracing paper)

Using the end of a paintbrush add paint dots of different sizes

Finish with a colorful piece of sari silk ribbon.

Ta - Da!!

Miniature Tea Bag Booklet

If you're a tea drinker there is a good chance that you've been seduced by the beautiful packaging to be found in those fun boxes. (pukka and yogi tea are my favorites for packaging :)

 

I saved a bunch of the envelopes and tiny tags and created my own mini book.

Here's how...

Materials you will need:

Lots of teabag packaging - paper envelopes & tags
Washi tape you love  (Etsy have a great range of sellers offering beautiful washi tape)
Embroidery threads or yarns which you may well have in your supplies already
Your favorite stamps, paints & embellishments or collage images
Sari silk ribbon (this is a great Etsy supplier) or any other ribbon you like to use.

Hole punch
Stapler
Glue stick
Scissors
A couple of small bull dog clips come in really handy!

First gather the teabag envelopes and trim to roughly the same square shape.  I mostly used the open edges of the teabag envelope for the spine edge of the book.

For those teabag envelopes I was trimming down to make pockets inside the book I used the closed edge along the spine leaving an opening.

I trimmed the opening edge to create a simple envelope flap to secure the tag that would live inside











Some of the teabag ranges include inspiring little quotes which I trimmed with washi tape and threaded with colorful embroidery threads.

These were then tucked in to the bound pockets with the colorful threads bursting out of the top of the mini book

Clear teabag envelopes make great little sealed pockets for a quote and an embellishment.

Spare teabag tags make great tabs which were stapled randomly to the top edge of some of the pages.

A simple hole punch made two holes and the binding was completed with a scrap of sari silk (you could also use ribbon, strong thread or yarn)









Now this little tea inspired book is ready for collage, photos, notes & other embellishment.


Enjoy over your next cup of tea!





Please know that I am an Etsy & Amazon affiliate which means that any item you may purchase via a link on my blog may earn me a small commission at no extra cost to you ;)

Single Stem Vases

Easy up cycling craft for a single stem flower.

Recycle a bottle.  Olive oil and vinegar bottles are always lovely shapes.  These bottles are balsamic vinegar bottles.

Drip white paint over the outside edges in a random fashion and allow too dry.

Using tissue paper (this is a Tim Holtz paper who doesn't LOVE Tim Holtz products!) gently glue to the outer edges of the bottle.  Mod Podge is a great product for gluing as you can use it to seal over the tissue paper too.

Ta - da!  Choose your favorite flower and gift or display.

I had three of these bottles so I glue dotted them together and wrapped scraps of hessian ribbon and embroidery thread in my supplies to create one display for three stems!

Please know that I am an Etsy & Amazon affiliate which means that any item you may purchase via a link on my blog may earn me a small commission at no extra cost to you ;)

Sari Silk Bookmarks

These are one of my favorite projects to my yoga loving friends.  I recently featured these in a gift idea blog post on my yoga & creativity blog, www.yogaskinny.com.

Here's how to make these handcrafted bookmarks from sari silk ribbon.  A perfect gift for your favorite bookworm, yoga loving or not!

You will need the following...

Sari silk ribbon.  

You can find some great suppliers on Etsy.  This is a supplier I love

Cellphone lariat.

I was lucky to find a bunch of these in a thrift store but you can also find them on Etsy and Amazon

Beads & charms.  

You may well have these in your craft stash at home

Embroidery thread.

Another crafting staple

Gather your materials!

Thread your choice of beads on the lariat.  Broken junk jewelry is a good option!  Leave a small loop at the end of the lariat for your ribbons to thread through.

I cut 10 inch lengths of ribbon to create a 5 inch ribbon tail on my bookmark

Secure tightly with a double knot and trim.  (Perhaps a dot of clear nail polish to secure if you like)

Thread a loop of embroidery thread through the lariat and take the two embroidery thread ends back through the loop to secure.

I had a bunch of tiny charms gifted to me so secured one on the end of the embroidery threads.  Choose a flattish charm just in case it ends up resting inside the pages of the book!

Ta Da!  Enjoy your reading time!

Please know that I am an Etsy & Amazon affiliate which means that any item you may purchase via a link on my blog may earn me a small commission at no extra cost to you ;)