Craft Ideas

pollyanna24

For the past week, I have spent hours cutting out skeletons and bats in readiness for my girls' party on Friday.

I've found that I actually quite enjoy it and find it quite therapeutic. Just not quite sure what crafts to get myself into. And also don't want to spend a lot of money.

I've seen that YouTube clip of making a pop out flower card which is the kind of thing I'm looking for. Just wondered if anyone had any other ideas?

trolleyrun

You could make scrapbooks for your girl, with pictures and other bits and pieces (tickets, a dried leaf from a walk, a drawing she's made etc) decorated with pretty papers, glitter and stickers. It'll be treasured as a memory book later in life.

Greeting cards are great to make. You can buy packs of 50 cards & envelopes for around £5. Look in £shops and craft shops to find things to decorate the cards with. People love receiving one-of-a-kind cards that you've evidently spent time on.

Do be careful with how much you buy though. I have around £3K's worth of craft stuff in my hobby storage (a huge cupboard)! It got a bit out of hand for a while, but I've been good and not bought any for ages. I've also sold off some stuff at car boot sales

tea_lover

Is it just paper crafts you're interested in, or anything? There's things like scrapbooking, card making, quilling, etc. When I was younger I had a paper press thing that I used to make paper with.... loved that

If you're looking more widely there's an unlimited number of crafts you could get [STRIKE]obsessed with [/STRIKE]into. Personally I love knitting, some basic crochet and am hoping to find space for a sewing machine soon (just need to distract OH first)

Randomjargon

My wife's friend started making Xmas decorations while she was on maternity leave as gifts for friends. They were little felt robins

NoGoodNamesLeft

I like origami. You can use any cheap paper to practice with, but once you get good at it you can make xmas decorations, bouquets or whatever you fancy. There's loads of online tutorials too.

Buzzybee90

There's lots of Christmas crating ideas over on the Christmas board

Birdie85

Papercrafts are easy to get into and can be as cheap or as expensive as you like. As already mentioned, you can buy a pack of card blanks for a few pounds then you just need some bits to stick on. You can get packs of papers and stickers etc from places like The Works and you could get a decent stash for less than £10. You will also notice how many pretty papers you can salvage from every day stuff like magazines and packaging. Broken jewellery, random buttons, ribbons etc look fab stuck onto cards.

If you have access to a printer, go onto the Papercraft Inspirations website and there are loads of free paper sets you can download and print off. These are brilliant for beginners as each month has a theme and there are background papers, patterned papers and tags etc to use.

If you enjoy cardmaking a pretty natural progression is to move onto scrapbooking. Just be strict and stay away from websites and fairs etc as it is so easy to get drawn in and spend a fortune on your stash! I am definitely speaking from experience!

If you want to be inspired, have a look on Pinterest. It is brilliant for all crafts and you'll end up with a list as long as your arm of things you *need* to make!

pollyanna24

Thanks for everyone's answers. Thought I'd try the first bits of that pop up flower card and I can't even get the first petals to look any good. Maybe I'm not cute out for this, haha! The petals are all different sizes no matter what I do!

oystercatcher

Sewing is back on trend after The Great British Sewing Bee. I really enjoy sewing and you could make some lovely clothes for your little girls if you put your mind to it. Fabric can be expensive but I have picked up some lovely bargains in charity shops for patchworking or you could even use things like duvet covers to start with until you were confident things would come out wearable. With the right fabric simple dresses and pyjamas are really easy to make.

pinetree

Hi I recently went to a demonstration of decopatch, basically its pieces of thin paper and using a special varnish glue you can decorate almost anthing from photoframes to wooden furniture. Just google decopatch loads comes up about it.

Scrapaholic

Don't be put off if your first effort isn't brilliant , it takes a bit of practice . I started off making cards and like others have said , lots of bits can be got quite cheaply . I actually don't have stacks of people to make cards for but still make the occasional one and our granddaughter loves to make them too. From cards I moved on to scrapbooking . I have a large ish stash of stuff as it can be quite addictive . I also did a card making and then a scrapbooking course which helped in the beginning . Have a bit of a try and you don't even have to have a great imagination . There are loads of easy but imaginative ideas online that you can adapt . All I need is a bit more time to use my things . Have fun .