Crafts and Craft Selling for Kids

Crafts & Craft Selling for Kids

If you are a crafter parent it won’t be long before one of your children asks, “Can I make things to sell too?” Then your quandary is, what can a child make that actually looks good enough to go in your shop or display? Fine craftsmanship is not exactly something your average ten year old is capable of. My daughter tried making pins in felt, which were adorable but were too much work for the price point they would sell at. She tried crochet, but couldn’t master anything beyond a chain. Finally what worked was “Jessamyn’s Button Hairbands,” which consisted of large cloth covered buttons (re-using fabrics from thrift shops) with elastics tied to the shanks on the back. Moreover, making them was a process she could do virtually by herself. I bought the supplies, designed her card, and she pays me back 50 cents for every button she sells. And she does very well--selling them at fairs at a low price point, yet earning enough to be the envy of all her friends.

Here is another idea for kids wanting to earn their keep, or like mine, to sustain their addiction to Pokemon cards.

Recycled Bag Tags & Bookmarks

Supplies & Tools:
Old Magazines
Scissors
Glue Stick
Paper Cutter
Mylar or Acetate sheets or any kind of flat, clear plastic
Colored paper (if for business it should be non-fading)
Laminating Sheets
Hole Punch
Plastic Lanyard or other string or yarn

Let the kids go through the old magazines cutting out all the headlines that are over 3/8” tall. Remember the letters must fit comfortably on a 1.25” strip of paper. If this will be for a “business” they can cut out all the letters individually and put them in marked envelopes for each letter, number, and one for symbols. Some of these headlines were funny enough to use all by themselves, come to think of it.

Using the paper cutter, cut 1.25” wide strips of colored paper (I had old scrapbooking paper the kids had been cutting up inefficiently for the last 6 years) or magazine pages with great color or texture for the background. If you don’t have a paper cutter you can use a scissor but the rolling cutter is more efficient and far safer than things like x-acto blades.

Now they can choose the letters they will use. Names are good, as are cool phrases and sports. Run the glue stick along the length of the strip of colored paper. Arrange the letters and press into the glue. Leave room on one end for a hole if a lanyard will be attached.

Cut a larger strip of acetate and glue the back of the colored paper onto it, so the tag will have some firmness. (We actually used the heavy plastic from a box of Pokemon cards for the strips, so we felt very virtuous and green.) Cut a strip of laminating paper and use it to carefully seal the front of the tag to the acetate, leaving at least 3/16” extra space all around the colored paper. This is undoubtedly the trickiest part of the whole process and your kids will need some practice to master it. You need to fold back just a corner of the laminating paper and then position it atop the tag. Then you slowly peel off the backing while smoothing it down at the same time, starting from that first corner. With the paper cutter trim the sealed edges. Punch a hole (you will need a good quality hole puncher, like McGill or Fiskars, available at craft stores) in the tag and add a lanyard or string.

The fun, hip, professional looking results can be used as a bag tag, a book mark, a backpack decoration, a necklace, a party favor, a seating tag, and I've even been thinking, earrings, if you want to work really, really small. The process can be used for children’s parties, school fair fundraisers, for starting your child’s own Etsy Shop, and of course, a few hasty Father’s Day gifts.

Jody Lee

http://www.astudiobythesea.etsy.com/

HOW TO: Eco-Friendly Label Making!

As a new member of The {NewNew} York Street Team, I decided to offer up a quick and fun little tutorial on one way of making eco-friendly tags or business promotional pieces, all from scrap materials... What follows is my tutorial:

What You'll Need:
•Scissors or an X-acto Knife
•Scrap paper (with a blank area for writing)
•An old magazine or other reading material that might contain interesting designs and be easy to cut out and use.
•Something to trace with (This should be the size and shape that you'd like your tag to be...Look for something around your house that you could use)
•A pen/pencil for tracing and writing
•Scrap string
•A staple-less stapler or appropriate adhesive

What You Need to Do With All That Stuff I Just Listed:
1.) Take the old magazine or other scrap reading material you've found and find an interesting design/drawing/background in it that could make for a cool looking tag. For me, I thumbed through an old Wired that my fiancée gave me the go-ahead to use (the last thing you want to do is cheese someone off by cutting up something they have no intentions of getting rid of). I found an interesting design inside, grabbed my tracing object and pencil, and traced around exactly what I wanted contained on my tag. In this case, I chose a genetically modified bell pepper because he looks pretty badass.











2.) Grab that scrap paper now, and trace on a blank portion of it with the same tracing object you chose to use in #1, and then cut everything out!


3.) Here's where staple-less stapler fun is to be had... Simply line up your design cut-out with your scrap paper cut-out (make sure the blank portion of the scrap paper is showing on one side, and your cut-out design is showing on the other), and slap em together with the wonderous staple-less stapler. If you don't have a staple-less stapler, you might opt to use an appropriate adhesive here instead.
4.) Grab a pen or pencil now, and write whatever the heck you desire on the blank side of your tag. For mine, because I don't have official "business cards" for my eco-friendly shop, I simply wrote out my message and shop address with the best penmanship I could muster up, and will use it as both a tag and business promotional material.

5.) Scrap string will come in handy now, to slip through one or both holes you've created with the stapler. I used scrap yarn from old knitting/crochet projects that I save. A crochet hook comes in handy for grabbing the string through the hole of the label and pulling it through, if you have one of an appropriate size lying around.

That's pretty much it!!!








If you want a more professional look you might opt out of the staple-less stapler and go for some adhesive or tape to hold the two pieces together. You might also have a stamp made that you can use to stamp these promo materials with your url, shop name, etc. Also for smoother edges, use an X-acto knife, by all means, when cutting these suckers out.

Here's my finished result. Frankenstein Bell Pepper looks a little worse for wear, but he's wearing it well.



-Kate
EcoKate.etsy.com