How To Make Handcrafted Cards

I’m joining in on Tutorial Tuesday today at Hope Studios. Swing by to check out the other awesome projects posted.

One of my favorite hobbies is making handcrafted cards. If you have scraps of paper/ribbon/embellishments and glue, you too can make handcrafted cards that look just as nice as the ones you’ll pay $4 or more for in the stores.

Here are quick “tutorials” on the most recent three I made.

BIRTHDAY CARD FOR 3 YEAR OLD NEPHEW

This card started with a blank note card I picked up at the local craft store. It was in a pack of 10/$1. All I did to dress it up was add the red ribbon (use a glue stick) and the 3-D gift and balloon stickers (reused from a card I made hubby last year). Easy and cheap.

ANNIVERSARY CARD FOR MY PARENTS

This card started life as a blank note card from a package of computer printable ones I picked up at an office supply store. To jazz it up, I stamped brown lettering on the background using a giant script stamp I found on clearance a couple years ago. Then I cut a strip of striped paper from my stash and glued it across the bottom. To set that off, I glued a thin ribbon on top. The word “LOVE” is a rub-on I had and I also had the 3D leaves and flowers that are just glued on too. This was a great way to use up some items I’ve had sitting around for a couple years.

BIRTHDAY CARD FOR MY HUBBY

Hubby does not like store-bought cards at all. Even though his birthday was on the 3rd, we just celebrated it this past Saturday with his favorite meal of chicken & grapes with cous cous and buster bar dessert (two more “freebie” tutorials for you!). I made sure to have a handcrafted card with a personal message inside because no matter how many times I’ve given him a bought card that contains the exact sentiments I want to share, he never reads them because they weren’t written just for him. So, to make him feel extra special, I put a little more embellishment into this card.

It also started as a blank, computer-printable note card. I used a 1-1/2” circle punch to punch out three circles from paper in my stash and then glued them on a strip of yellow paper. To add some texture, I used the zig-zag stitch on my sewing machine around the top and bottom circle and sewed a random pattern using a straight stitch across the middle circle. Here’s a close up:

Next I glued buttons on top of each circle before attaching the yellow paper to the card. Lastly, I attached the blue and white striped paper to the card and a ribbon to finish it off with a little red sticker in the corner that said “Wish”. And, what did the birthday boy think of it? He LOVED it! The few extra minutes it took to make it was totally worth it to make him feel special.

So, don’t pay $4 or more for those fancy cards from the stores. Look through your stash and see what you can come up with. Speaking from past experience, people love receiving handcrafted cards more than store-bought cards any day.