Craftside

4th of July Firework Decoration and More News to "Spark" Your Creativity

I made 13- 4th of July Washi tape decorations a while back, but this giant recycled Voss water bottle didn't get wrapped with washi tape and topped with a bouquets of sparkly pipe cleaners to make a 4th of July firework decoration... until now.

This project was so fun and simple you could whip up a bunch in minutes for virtually no money. I was inspired by this page in Washi Tape: 101+ Ideas for Paper Crafts, Book Arts, Fashion, Decorating, Entertaining, and Party Fun! where Courtney Cerruti uses a wine bottle decorated with Washi tape.

I simply made stripes with red, white and blue washi tape covering the whole bottle and cap.

Then I wrapped a bunch of sparkly pipe cleaners at one end with another pipe cleaner to secure them together.

I attached them to lid with a bit of hot glue.

To make the flag, I used Duck Brand Glitter Tape.

I folded a strip of it half around one end of a pipe cleaner and cut out a triangle.

NOTE: Can I say how great it is to cut sticky stuff with the new Fiskars Duck Edition scissors? I have been making a lot of stuff with Duck Tape since it's now available in such amazing prints, and now that I am a Washi tape junkie having some good non-stick scissors will be even more useful.

The last detail was to write "Bang!" on the Blue Glitter Duck Tape flag.

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And now onto some more tutorials, recipes and more:

Body Mind Beauty Health

Free Peace Mandela to download and color yourself

Quarry SPOON

Recipe for raw chocolate-carrot cake

Whole Home News

How to build yoru own herb-drying rack

Rock Paper Ink

10 rules of color: Know that people see color differently

Walter Foster

Washi tape birthday cards

QGeekBooks

Recipe for a Gin Rickey

More about the new Quarry book:

Washi Tape: 101+ Ideas for Paper Crafts, Book Arts, Fashion, Decorating, Entertaining, and Party Fun!

by Courtney Cerruti

Perfect to use for parties. See how to create invitations, gift wrap, and goodie bags. Holidays have never been more colorful with ideas for ornaments, window adornments, and even garland.

Decorations for your home and office are easy and inexpensive when you use washi tape. Wall décor, borders and lampshades can become unique works of art and give your home a personal touch.

You can even use washi tape in fashion. Dress up your glasses, shoes and jewelry using these simple ideas and designs. And because it’s safe to use on delicate items, washi tape is great for personalized gifts like vases and photo albums.

Washi Tape by Courtney Cerruti offers 101 amazing ideas that will make this new craft tape your new favorite thing. It’s safe to use almost anywhere and great fun for children!

 

 

Father's Day Gift Book Giveaway and how to make an I "heart" Dad pop-up card

Today I am mixing it up a bit. I have a super big book gift pack filled with "traditionally" male books. I say 'traditional' as I believe that girls would like some or all of these books in their library, but in the spirit of upcoming Father's Day I have put together this collection of 7 books that I bet Dad would find pretty darn interesting.

Jimi Hendrix Gear

Audubon Birdhouse Book

World's Best Cocktails

Learn to Weld

How to Draw Harley Davidson Motorcycles

DIY Solar Projects

and how could I not include a copy of 

Knits for Men?

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And now a project all of you crafters: whip up an "I 'heart' Dad" pop-up card using the pop-up alphabet that you can Downloadfor free, designed by Helen Hiebert author of Playing with Pop-ups: The Art of Dimensional, Moving Paper Designs.

I was inspired by this page from Playing with Pop-ups that features the tower of babel project. In my first pop-up card I made for Mother's day, all the letters ran side by side so this time I thought I'd try them vertically.

I pulled each of the letters I needed, along with a few extras.

The letters D, A, and D I aligned vertically on the page.

I then flipped the letters so they would print in reverse. This is so the lines don't show on the front of the finished project.

I left the 2 "I" together, as I attach the heart to the second one, and I left the D, A and D attached as well.

To assemble the card I folded an 8 1/2 by 11 piece of paper in half and glued the pop up letters in place.

Then I glued the heart, a photo of me and my dad, and added a few Washi Tape embellishments.

 

13 Washi Tape Crafts for 4th of July

Along with 13 ideas for decorating with washi tape for the 4th of July, you can get yourself in the running for a copy of Washi Tape: 101+ Ideas for Paper Crafts, Book Arts, Fashion, Decorating, Entertaining, and Party Fun! and 8 rolls of Duck Brand Washi Tape!

I was so inspired by the 101 projects in Washi Tape. Maybe I went a little far? Nahhh.

If you are into washi tape as much as I am, enter here by May 17th, 2014 and then pop on over to Craft Gossip Recycling for a second chance to win a second book and tape set and see how to decorate shoes with leopard washi tape wings and how to make a tile bracelet. 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here are some detailed shots of the 13 different 4th of July projects.

I combined the 2 tapes to make a big 4 on a large pillar candle. This one happens to be a faux candle.

I thought the red heart washi tape and the blue striped washi tape would be perfect to use to decorate for 4th of July.

I added stripes onto a lampshade and covered the lamp base.

I made striped flags on each of an Ikea star lamp which I also added a stripe of red heart washi tape on each star.

Another easy decoration to make is a mobile with an embroidery hoop and Ikea stars (but you could cut some out of cardstock) that I decorated with the washi tape.

This one is pure silliness. I spotted the red solo cup crystal stemware out on Pinterest, and thought it would be silly to also make one with the tiny red solo cup shot glass size, and then of course, decorate the recycled candle sticks that you use to make the "stemware" part.

I wrapped the ends of chop sticks for a tiny touch of color.

Glasses, Fiestaware, cake plates, electric votives and matchbooks and matchboxes are perfect to dress up with touches of washi tape.

The white votive surround was made with a recycled creamer bottle.

It also happens to fit on my wrist so I can wear it as a bracelet! I very carefully cut the top and bottom off.

More about the Quarry book:

Washi Tape: 101+ Ideas for Paper Crafts, Book Arts, Fashion, Decorating, Entertaining, and Party Fun!

by Courtney Cerruti

If you have never heard of washi tape, get ready to enter a bright new world of paper crafts! Originating in Japan, washi paper is stronger than wood-pulp paper making it perfect for use in projects like origami and scrapbooking. The tape is low tack and slightly transparent, in a mix of adorable colors and patterns, and a brilliant way to make all of your crafts even better. Perfect to use for parties. See how to create invitations, gift wrap, and goodie bags. Holidays have never been more colorful with ideas for ornaments, window adornments, and even garland.

 

Decorations for your home and office are easy and inexpensive when you use washi tape. Wall décor, borders and lampshades can become unique works of art and give your home a personal touch. You can even use washi tape in fashion. Dress up your glasses, shoes and jewelry using these simple ideas and designs. And because it's safe to use on delicate items, washi tape is great for personalized gifts like vases and photo albums. Washi Tape by Courtney Cerruti offers 101 amazing ideas that will make this new craft tape your new favorite thing. It's safe to use almost anywhere and great fun for children!

Maker extraordinaire, Courtney Cerruti (ccerruti.com) teaches at the San Francisco Center for the Book, and online at Creativebug.com. She studied painting at UC Santa Cruz and the University of Bordeaux in Bordeaux, France where she had her first exhibition and hosted many book making parties. In addition to teaching, Courtney is a freelance artist and avid instagrammer and pinner (on pineterest). In a previous life she did windows and display at Anthropologie as well as teaching and working at Paper Source. She makes something everyday and works mostly doing windows, wedding installations and set design. She is the author of Washi Tape and Playing with Image Transfers.

http://www.ccerruti.com

Craftside at Craftcation and Courney Cerruti's Washi Tape Book Makes Its Debut

I had such a great time at Craftcation. If you were there, I bet you did too. And if you are looking to do a great event that includes crafting classes as well as seminars on how to have a craft business, I highly recommend checking it out next year! One of the things I had the pleasure of doing, was handing the first copy of Washi Tape: 101+ Ideas for Paper Crafts, Book Arts, Fashion, Decorating, Entertaining, and Party Fun! to the author Courtney Cerruti in person! I generally just mail them out.

I was also able to share it with Craftcation attendees which worked out perfectly as Scotch Brand Washi Tape was a sponsor.

The hotel lobby walls were covered in big zig-zags of washi tape and I decided to cover some of our Makeready journals in the Scotch washi tape that was all over for us to play with.

I worked around the line drawings on the covers and simply striped tape like this letter "M" project in Washi Tape.

More about the new Quarry book:

Washi Tape: 101+ Ideas for Paper Crafts, Book Arts, Fashion, Decorating, Entertaining, and Party Fun!

by Courtney Cerruti

If you have never heard of washi tape, get ready to enter a bright new world of paper crafts! Originating in Japan, washi paper is stronger than wood-pulp paper making it perfect for use in projects like origami and scrapbooking. The tape is low tack and slightly transparent, and add in a mix of adorable colors and patterns, a brilliant way to make all of your crafts even better.

 

Perfect to use for parties. See how to create invitations, gift wrap, and goodie bags. Holidays have never been more colorful with ideas for ornaments, window adornments, and even garland.

Decorations for your home and office are easy and inexpensive when you use washi tape. Wall décor, borders and lampshades can become unique works of art and give your home a personal touch.

You can even use washi tape in fashion. Dress up your glasses, shoes and jewelry using these simple ideas and designs. And because it’s safe to use on delicate items, washi tape is great for personalized gifts like vases and photo albums.

 

Washi Tape by Courtney Cerruti offers 101 amazing ideas that will make this new craft tape your new favorite thing. It’s safe to use almost anywhere and great fun for children!

Maker extraordinaire, Courtney Cerruti (ccerruti.com) teaches at the San Francisco Center for the Book, and online at Creativebug.com. She studied painting at UC Santa Cruz and the University of Bordeaux in Bordeaux, France where she had her first exhibition and hosted many book making parties. In addition to teaching, Courtney is a freelance artist and avid instagrammer and pinner (on pineterest). In a previous life she did windows and display at Anthropologie as well as teaching and working at Paper Source.  She makes something everyday and works mostly doing windows, wedding installations and set design.  She is the author of Quarry’s Playing with Image Transfers.

 

About washi tape she says: “I’m obsessed with washi tape. It’s funny that you may never have heard of it, because once I discovered it, I couldn’t stop using it, and now it pops up in almost all of my work.  I’m a self-proclaimed converter. If you take any one of my workshops, you will use washi tape and then you’ll go directly to the nearest store and buy it! It’s that awesome.