Duct tape earrings with cardboard fliers: How to

Ever received those ad-fliers on the street and wondered what to do with them? A nuisance at times and serving their purpose on others, you cannot escape them. Often we pick them up out of sympathy for people who stand hours in the sun to give them away. They probably earn a pittance.

Once they glare at you at unwanted places in the household, you prefer to trash them.

If you can use some quick thinking and have a thing for the funky when it comes to dressing up, it's possible to make the best use of these.
In this project, I have used a cardboard flier from one of the restaurants near home.

Here it is, a modified version of what I got.

Years ago when I was sick, I used such cardboard, and cardboard from medicine cartons, and that was what prompted me to start work on paper crafts. A single piece of such commercial card paper throws up a million ideas. This time I decided to simply tape them. It is amazing what a strip of duct tape or decorative tape can do. Limit not your creative brain. Go ahead and try this with industrial tape of different colours too.


On another day, I would have cut the pictures out for gorgeous bookmarks. This time though, my roll of gold colour tape came in handy.

So, the materials you need are

-- used flier cardboard or card stock from cartons of toothpaste, medicines or small gifts around home
-- a pair of scissors

-- duct tape
-- small hole punch (a revolving hold punch plier that you get in hardware stores helps) Else, use could use a pin and toothpick although the finish may not be great
-- jump rings
-- earring fish hooks

Optional:  Super Glue or gorilla glue

In a few easy steps, you can get a funky pair of earrings.
Tape the cardboard with enough tape.

What I have here is a thick surface tape. With tape that is thinner, you may need to be careful while cutting and pasting.

Cut the cardboard into squares. Optionally, you may first cut the cardboard and tape each piece.

Use the small hole punch to poke holes on one corner of each of these pieces.

 

Fix a jumpring each for two squares. Now add another square each to these.

Duct tape earrings with cardboard fliers

To these two sets, add a fish hook each.

A problem may arise with these cut pieces. The edges may feel sticky because of the duct tape glue. To set that right, you can lace the edges with the Super glue or Gorilla glue or multi-surface glue, and let them dry out. Your cardboard earrings are ready. 

Do this project on a leisurely afternoon, as a crisis management bit ahead of a party, or simply to indulge kids. The short time needed for this can give you that satisfaction of seeing the results up early. The earrings are light weight. Get over the popular squirm of them looking cheap. They are funky. And you just did your bit, not to throw away cardboard.

Picture courtesy: Radhika M B

For permissions, write to : radicreative@gmail.com

Kid craft: Cute fish on my machine

After consistent pestering, my friend Bhumika from Bangalore, a super-woman, sent me this lovely picture of recycle craft collage that her toddler son Mitr and she made.

Looks super simple and fun, doesn't it? And what does it take? Not fancy glitter paper or expensive crafting apparatus. But simple advertisement pamphlet trash that floods your doorsteps.

How to do it? Self explanatory, ain't it?

You will need:

- a pair of scissors

- a pencil to draw the fish out on a base paper

- a base paper of course:)

- some black glazed paper. alternatively, either construction paper or if lucky,
some ad page that has plenty of black from an old magazine - this is for the eye and fin

- loads of paper ads trash

- Glue or gum

- a big bottle cap, or small circle-shaped bowl - try anything that comes handy to  draw out a circle for the eye

Kids love their hands getting sticky with glue! And the idea of messing up a place in excitement - how their eyes light up!

Their love for messing up comes in perfectly handy here.

Bhumika helped him cull out random shapes from the ad-trash. She suggests that since it is kids who are involved, it is better to tear these pieces. Together, the two stuck them on to the fish-shaped base paper in such a way. In doing so, pieces are likely to pop out of the base paper fish edges. Do not worry. You could cut out the extra parts later, says Bhumika.

For a toddler, this is a bit of an effort, and for you, an unobtrusive way of teaching alignment. Summer vacation in India draws to a close. Such a collage piece is useful not just for vacations but any leisurely weekend.

Guess where the cute collage fish found its way to?

The facade of their washing machine!

They stuck it up with fridge magnets.

Meanwhile, I was so much in love with the rag-tag fish, that I tried my own experiments with the picture on Pixlr on my machine aka laptop.

You could try it too. It could be this fun way of using your kid's art to make something more permanent to frame and put up on your wall, or transfer on to some keepsake around home.

As for me, I had fun just playing with the different options on the online photo editing site.

 Thanks a tonne Bhumika! You made my holiday fun enough!

Fishes and bicycles go together, don't they! Courtesy Gloria Steinem and Irina Dunn! Am all for printing this one and framing it up. Thanks to my li'l friend Mitr.


Picture courtesy: Bhumika K
Picture experiment courtesy: Radhika M B

For permissions to use pictures, write to: radicreative@gmail.com

Cute kiddy costume bookmarks

Have there been times when a pile of ad-fliers got thrown around home for no reason? You had to toss them into the basket, but wondered what else could have been done!

Out here in US, that weekly mailbox flood of coupon fliers from local stores is a routine. Their volume and weight vary with changing occasions. And piles of fliers get heavier during the halloween-thanksgiving-christmas season.

Ahead of Halloween this year, my mailbox got full too, with some fliers of party stores. Cute pictures of kid costumes. I have not much use of them, as I do not have kids. Even if I did, am not sure the idea of all those cute but expensive costumes would draw me to the store.

So, I did what comes best to my head. Made bookmarks using some of those pictures.

It was not so much of an effort, considering I had supplies ready.

• a pair of scissors, glue
• felt pens, of the colour of paper that had to be used
• cardboard from cartons of products that I buy
• wooden beads, paper punch and yarn to match
• most importantly, pictures cut out from coupon mail or ads 

First step, cut the strips or blocks of the pictures from the main flier.

Get to work next, with each of those pictures. Choose individual pieces that have minimal or no pricing prints on them.

Here, they resemble stickers that you buy at a bomb of price from stationery and craft stores.

If you do not make bookmarks, consider using some double-sided tape on their rear so you can use for some other projects, or simply stick them up on your kid's shelves and storage boxes.

 I love the `prisoner' costume at the bottom of this picture.

I cut out enough to store for later use. After all, it is not all times of the year that you get such pictures on fliers!

I cut some cardboard from cartons to size, sand-papered its glossy side, stuck brown craft paper on its sides for one bookmark, and patterned `tablecloth design' paper on the other.

I also made use of a heart shape that I had cut out from a used gift-wrap or wrapping paper.

Next step: Stuck the pictures up, and used felt pens to touch the bookmarks up. I used the paper punch on one of the two bookmarks, and strung some thread into a bead for its `tag' feel.

Here goes another picture.

That's not all,

I used another picture, of a baby, that I had cut out from another ad, to make the following bookmark. This one can be used as a gift tag too.

Try this using pictures you see around home. It only needs some patience, the paraphernalia apart.

For use of pictures, write to: radicreative@gmail.com

Photo courtesy: Radhika M B