Are You a Scrapper?

by Katie

If the answer is yes, please specify: do you fight in back alleys with wiry, deft speed? If so, then you're infinitely cooler than I am. If you put together little collage things of photos, ticket stubs, and old birthday cards to put in albums, then you and I have more in common and we both have significantly less street cred.

Regardless of our respective levels of cool, I do enjoy making and keeping scrapbooks. They are artistic, visual accounts of certain periods in our lives, and in creating them we can (finally) make use of all those pictures we take and momentos we keep. (If you don't keep momentos per se, check your wallet/bottom of your purse and see what scraps of paper you can dig up.

Most of my scrapbook pages are filled with photographs and personal stuff--remember the day we went snorkeling? Went to the farmer's market? The week in Mexico? That friend's wedding/shower/housewarming/hospitalization?

There are times, however, when I want to make a good, old-fashioned collage and not feel like a weirdo by hanging it up on the fridge. I've found that scrapbooking gives me this opportunity. Thought I'd share this idea with you.

If you keep scrapbooks and you also keep magazines around because you're sure you'll somehow use them one day, here's a creative exercise: make "time capsule" pages that recall significant moments and your state of mind in the current year. Here are a few examples of this kind of thing.

I like throwing in a political cartoon here and there, some popular references that might prove humorous down the line, and little pictures/words to remind me of my current obsessions (note that Tina Fey doesn't make it onto a collage until 2012--I'm a little behind the times with my newfound love of 30 Rock).

Basically, this gives you something to do with all those old mags you've been saving for a crafty project and gives you an excuse to glue/tape together a bunch of random nonsense.

Happy scrapping!

Cold Saturday? Make Postcards!

by Katie

Cold Saturdays are a good time for drinking coffee, doing yoga, and making  postcards to send to your totally awesome entourage of friends and family.

This is a great upcyling project--you get to use the rando cardboard you have lying around your house (in the form of the almost-empty cracker/tampon/pepsi boxes I know you have) and the old magazines you've been hanging onto because you aren't done with them yet but won't ever actually read through again.

You can use: 

• Any kind of thin cardboard--I seriously raided my recycling bin and scavenged for almost-empty boxes around my house
• Any kind of paper or image--magazines, scrapbook paper, photographs, newspaper--whatever
• Double-sided tape (of course)
• Decorative tape/electrician's tape/duct tape/masking tap/scotch tape--this will cover the edges of your postcard, so choose according to your aesthetic
• Crayons/markers
• Plain paper or stationary to use for the writing side (especially if your cardboard doesn't have a plain side)

The good thing about postcards is that they can be pretty much any size (within reason). So cut up your cardboard into postcard-size rectangles.

Choose the images for your postcards. This is the fun part--you'll start seeing things in old magazines that jump out at you for different people. You can choose one large image per postcard or do some with a collage of smaller things. Alternatively, have some of your own photos printed and use those. They're your art!

Cover your postcards with the images/photos/paper you've chosen. This is why I love double-sided tape. I pretty much buy it in bulk these days. Make sure to cover the printed side of the cardboard, not the plain side. You'll use that for writing. You don't want to be writing on a glossy Nabisco box top.

Tape around the edges. You don't want two layers of paper, you want one cohesive postcard. Get creative with the taping. It can add to the look.

Then, your postcards are ready to be written on, adorned, and addressed! First things first: draw an address box in the bottom right corner, and draw yourself a little square for the stamp so you don't have to cover any of your writing with these necessities later.

Write message, fill in address, and then either go nuts with the crayons (or markers, or whatever floats your boat) or just leave it plain. If you're using crayons, write your note first or you'll be writing over wax. 

Some examples:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your friends will be thrilled to get their totally original, personalized, awesome postcard in the mail from you. People love getting good mail. And people love knowing that something was handmade, just for them. I know this for a fact. Go--embrace the art of snail mail!