Don't toss those scraps~

You heard me. Don't toss those scraps! This is one of the first thing my cousin taught me when she was teaching me to scrapbook. To some, it seems silly and tedious. To me, it's a good way to stretch your supplies and your money! You might be asking what you could do with scraps? Let me list some things and then I'll show you some photos of cards I've made with scraps (or mostly with scraps.)

1. use those long narrow strips left over from trimming 12x12 papers for accents (use in place of strips of ribbon)  or cluster together for an eye-catching design on scrapbook pages or cards
2. Punch small circles out of scrap pieces. Arrange to make a lollipop, flower or just use the circles as they are for embellishments or accents
3. Use scrap pieces to condition stamps
4. Use  rectangle shaped strips to make a card (I'll show a picture of that below)
5. punch hearts and use to make hearts or valentines.
6. Punch out triangles, use a piece of twine or string to make a little banner accent for a scrapping page or card.
7. Piece squares together to make a "paper quilt" look on a card or layout.
8. round the corners of squares to make a pretty little embellisment
9. Napkin rings! (easy!)
10. Bookmarks!
11. make pull tabs for layouts or cards
12. take narrow strips and glue onto cardstock to make your own funky background paper
13. take 4x2 rectangles, fold over and make mini cards

There are plenty of ideas that I'm blanking on at the moment(it's after midnight as I'm writing this), but you get the idea. There are lots of times when I'm crafting and I just need a "little bit" of something. Instead of cutting up a big piece of paper, I'll dip into my 'scrap basket". I've got a plastic tub and I've got all the pieces in there. It's not very organized, but my good friend, Trudy has hers in a file system. She has a plastic bin without a top that's wide enough to hold file folders. Each folder has a color written on the tab. She has folders for "blues/greens, red/oranges, yellow/greens," etc. It's really easy to find what you need by just flipping through the folders. I honestly WISH I were that organized. My methods are sort of like "barely contained chaos." Here are a few examples of cards I've made using some scraps!

use rectangles together to make a background!

Glue sqaures down in a quilt pattern!

Arrange circles to make a lollipop. Roll up a scrap to make the "stick". Use a white scrap to make the stamped sentiment

use scraps to embellish cards!

Use 2x4 rectangles, fold over and make mini cards

use rectangles to make a card design

 

How do YOU use your scraps. Share with me!

Happy crafting!