Making cards?

KK

I'm also an avid card maker, although don't seem to have so much time now - I do it on the dining room table whilst I am watching TV in the evening.
E-Bay is a good source of crafting bits, but not always that cheap. I don't buy ready made cards, but buy packs of card from places like WH Smith and Woolworths (look out for BOGOFs) and cut it up myself. All you need is a cutting mat, a scalpel and a stainless steel ruler. Personally I use plain white envelopes, or Woolies do a pack of 20 coloured envelopes for about £1.50.

I still have a lot of stuff left over from art college years ago, so paints, coloured pencils etc I have already. I've also plundered my daughter's craft drawer for fancy scissors, paper punches etc. Yellow Moon/Baker Ross catalogue do good stuff and are often fund raising for schools and brownie packs, so they benefit from your purchase too.

I save all sorts of bits of card, wrapping paper and anything with a texture and by adding embellishments like beads (very cheap to buy glass seed and bugle beads in fabulous colours) sewn on with dental floss or invisible thread and sequins. I also buy things like mulberry handmade paper and other nice papers and use these in little bits. It's amazing what you can do with scraps.

The best thing I did was go on a one day card making course at my local adult education institute which gave me loads of inspiration and confidence. I also got lots of card making books from the library and got lots of ideas from there too. I take photos of all my cards so I can remember them too.
I don't sell mine, but send enough cards to make it worth while making my own, and I really enjoy it. You can print out lettering on a PC in color and black and white and on tracing paper which looks good. You can do your own calligraphy which is nice. I use paper punches a lot as they can look very effective and are only a couple of £s each (Tesco do brilliant craft stuff very cheap) and you can use the punched out shapes as well as the paper with the shapes punched out.

I buy stuff from Woolies, 1st Stop Stationers (very good stuff), Art shops, WH Smith, Wilkinson, Tesco etc. Lakeland also do good stuff. Also any kids art supplies are good.

I also take my own photos on a digital camera, then print them out on matt paper and these can be very effective. I press flowers in the spring and summer and these can look great. I don't have a flower press - just heavy recipe books and kitchen paper!

I think books have been my best source of inspiration and you then realise you can do a lot without resorting to commercial peel offs, cards toppers and other bits included in 'card making' kits.

The woman on QVC is fun to watch (Dawn somebody I think) but their kits are pricey. I now have a huge box of card making stuff, but I don't think I have spent more than £50 to gather it all (I could be way out of course...)

Have fun and good luck

If anyone wants to PM me I can send them some piccies of my cards if interested.

Ronankfan

My children and I make cards for family and friends and they really enjoy it - its a nice thing to do and fairly cheap too and there is nothing that beats the HM touch.

kittiwoz

Fred Aldous is a very good art shop and sells card making stuff.

weenie

Hi all!!!

Ive been making my own cards now for about a year, and it took me a while to find the best and cheapest places for card bits and bobs. I tend to buy off ebay quite alot.

However another few good and cheap sites are these......


http://www.craftsite.co.uk/
https://www.twiddleys.co.uk
Have a look and see what you think.
:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

Mado

To make "cheap" cards, recycle!!!!

you can cut out bits of existing cards, and stick them on a new one (in the windows for example!).
Wrapping paper gives very nice background paper.

You can find buttons or variuos embellishments from charity shops.
I have found that builders' double sided tape from Poundland (3 rools for £1) is just as good as the craft shops expensive one.

If you have a decent guillotine, manilla folders (cream coloured ones) are an excellent cheap base for cards....

I bought a few stamps on Ebay, but found that you can also print images from basic Clipart and colour them in.

You can use normal felt tips for a nice effect: colour in a bit of plastic and rub a fine brush in it to "paint" in the picture. Nice effect!!!!

nic82

I paid a visit to The Works at lunchtime to have a look at what they've got.

They have packs of 50 premium quality cards and envelopes for £7.99 (works out at 16p per card) or you could get two packs for £9.99 (10p per card). They had packs of cream, white, gold and silver. They also had packs with mixed colours in at £6.99 for 50 (not sure why the price is lower!).

They had lots of packs of padded hearts, shiny shapes (made out the same stuff as sequins), coloured match sticks, pompoms, etc. Can't remember what the prices were for these but they were pretty reasonable. Some items were rather, um, garish in colour though. No pretty pastels to be seen.

They also had a cardmaking book which was reduced to £1.99.

In the past, I've also bought sheets of hologrammed card from Stationary Box. These places are much cheaper than shops such as Hobbycraft (which I love but don't allow myself to visit too often as I can spend both too much money and time there!).

ladygrey_2

have all the 'Works' got sales on?

aimeelister

if you have a guiloteene (spelling?!) my mum used to contact the local printers and ask for their off cuts (usually free!) and then cut any suitable card to size and use them as cards all you need is the envelopes. the rest of the paper was sometimes cut down to make notepad/noteblox with just a note from....... (insert persons name) ........and in a nice box went as presents!

auditbabe

Poundland does kits for a £1 amazingly enought. The cards are a reasonal quality but I find the value is in thebits and bobs that come with them. They also do good quality stickers and scrapbooking kits. As well as other odds and sods. Right now they have Easter card kits there were 3 different kits yesterday in Kingd Lynn. :T

tru

I buy my blanks, envelopes and cello bags from THIS person, he has a website too. Delivery 2 days after payment, excellent condition too. No, it's not my account

Couldn't possibly tell you where I get all card toppers, stickers, etc. from, I've made it into a biz and don't want competition from you lot Sold 26 cards today, yes I'm showing off but I'm very excited :j :j