Valentines cards from the recycling

I mentioned to CBC that it would be nice to have a Valentines card this year (I ended up not getting one last year due to him skiing and then realised I should probably get on and make one.

I decided I would like to recycle one or two elements that I had saved for the card. I ended up making two.

This first one utilised a circle that held a Patisserie Valerie cake which CBC had brought home - it was virtually clean so I snaffled it away- it immediately said POCKET WATCH to me so I then cut some hearts out of the Patisserie Valerie box which I had also saved which has some heart-patterned gold card and serendipitously, held exactly 12 hearts around the edge. I then added some  silver outline stickers for the numbers and then made hands out of a bit more of the packaging. In retrospect, I wish I had mounted the hearts on 3d sticky pads so they stood out a bit more.

Here you can see the heart patterning a bit better but not the numbers so well.

I then wrote the wording freehand and added some little hand-drawn hearts.

The second card made use of some patterned insides of envelopes I'd saved to make some more kitty cards as well as some spotty paper from an old card insert. I mounted them with their heads floating and hand wrote the greeting.  I also used a corner cutter on both cards.

Which one do you like best?

xx
 

Handmade Valentines card ideas

Here's a post from February 2017 where I shared ideas for eco-friendly or handmade cards. Should you feel like dabbling in a burst of creativity, then here's your chance to be inspired

Super easy, eco-friendly Valentines Cards ideas

Hi there,

Just in case you have left it too late to buy a card or you fancy making your own, I thought I'd link to a few previous posts of mine in which I have shared simple ways to make cards:

 6 easy peasy Valentines cards you can make yourself

This Dot to dot post card was one of the 6 ideas I suggested in the post above.  This one, as you can see, is ridiculously easy to make.

Dot to Dot

Envelope hearts

As part of a Heart swap back in 2012, I made a box of heart cards for Tracy, my partner and this is a design I have made numerous times for engagement cards which uses recycled envelope inards in contrasting patterns. It could work well for Valentines too!

Heart swap post

The card below was the card I made for Tracy to accompany the gift, but I don't see why this couldn't work as a simple Valentines card. I used the heart stickers I had used as masks to paint her a heart mug, as they were still sticky, rather than chucking them away.

Just add stickers...

Citrus hearts

These card are not Valentines cards as such but since they contain hearts, they could be a nice non-soppy idea for someone in your life!

Hearty drink 

A slice of my heart

Ribbon hearts idea

If you click the link in the caption, you can see how I made this card by utilising those annoying ribbons in clothing that are for hangers but stick out of jumpers and dresses annoyingly.

Ribbons from clothing card

Buttons:
 Buttons can act like Mosaic pieces and I love a good mosaic! All the below were a case of arranging and sticking with PVA glue or sticky tape! If you save those buttons from clothing but never seem to use them, now is your time!

Button heart idea

The wedding card that could be a Valentines.

Rainbow buttons

Yet another button card... The background blue is from a Tissue box!

Office Essentials holepunch card

I had sooo much traffic to this Valentines idea post a few years ago, I think it was because it said the phrase, Office Essentials in it! Anyway, this one is another very non-soppy idea and rather like the buttons is a form of mosaic but with hole-punched pieces from some paper that was going into the recycling.

Holepunch valentines

Origami hearts:
 If you look for a You tube tutorial, this is where I got this idea from for Origami hearts. These ones were made out of old envelopes! I am TERRIBLE at Origami but I found these super easy and I even managed to get one of the girls in the office to make one for her boyfriend by showing her how.

Origami hearts

Scrap card mosaic:

Most of the card in this mosaic for my husband came from tissue boxes, junk mail or other packaging except for the holographic one- have a look and see what packaging can be used!

And finally, here is yet another mosaic card idea,but this was the first Valentines my now-husband made for me back in 2010, so it's not just me who likes to give the crafty idea a go!!!! If I can find any of his other ones, I will post them..

Do you have any Valentines cards ideas? Do share if so and let me know if you use any of these!

Much love,

Kezzie xx

Linking up with Creative Mondays at Claire Justine's! So long since I last linked up!

Valentines cards 2021

 This year, for Valentines, I suggested to CBC that it would be fun for us to make cards for each other one evening. He agreed and so on the Saturday night of the 13th February, I set up the dining table in the dining room (grand term for a very tiny room full of my clutter) with a whole selection of crafting materials: papers and cards of plain and patterned varieties, odds and ended salvaged from packaging, crafting hole punches in various shapes, PVA glue, bits and pieces galore.

Neither of us had an idea but both of us started with an identical white base card:

I decided to start with using a Martha Stewart edging punch with a pretty interlocking rings cut out.  I am really chuffed to have this as I admired this very same punch in my Stepmum's craft collection years ago and asked if she could get me one for my birthday that same year.  She tried but that design was not available anymore so got me a different one (also very nice).  Last year, a friend of my mum's got rid of some craft stuff and passed it onto me and lo and behold, here was the very same punch in the box of stuff! It was a £30 punch so I am very grateful!

Once I'd done this, I spied a bird punch I've had for years.  CBC has become obsessed with the birds in the garden this year, he gets up and stares at them out of the window and has bought all sorts of feeders and food, constantly competing with the neighbours. I decided I would make him a bird Valentines card based on the birds in our garden/.

I started by punching some Mister lack birds out of card.  I decided to draw and colour some features on them so added a yellow beak and white eye with my watercolour pencils. I then punched some brown birds from some brown paper and decided those were Missus Blackbirds.  To add the features, I got a load of browns, peaches, whites and yellow pencils and added some details to her body.  Then an orangey beach and a shiny beady eye (with gel pens).   I decided that Missus Blackbird could double up as a sparrow (which we get lots of).  I tried arranging them in various ways and decided on a column of pairs of birds (with love hearts to give a tentative Valentines theme).  At this point, I realised that CBC's favourite birds are the Blue tits which he's trying to lure from next door's garden so I embellished a pair of white punched birds.

It felt a bit sparse putting them straight onto the white so I added a strip of turquoise (to represent a sunny sky) from an old envelope and embellished the join with gel pen dots.

Once I've drawn the love hearts on and painstakingly afixed the birds (with a cotton bud and PVA), I decided to add a message using my leaf punch.

Inside, I used the spare pair of Blackbirds (usurped by Blue tits) to add the central greeting in the card.

My card used sparing materials- just a bit of brown card, black card and turquoise envelope plus pens.

I am a card minimalist.  

CBC is a card maximallist and used ALLLLLLL the materials but I have to say, his card was an imaginative triumph!

The card had a single red heart on the outside... but the inside was an idyllic scene with a lonely squirrel.  The squirrel came from some granola packaging that I had squirreled away to use on a card some time (see what I did there??!)  The 'joke' about Kezzie clutter- our long standing disagreement about me having too much stuff!

He even decorated the envelope.

As well as the squirrel landscape, I had a patterned envelope- 

The 1st stripy envelope was supposed to represent a musical stave and a flute (there are dangling silver notes from the stave of 3 lines rather than 5 but he was fed up with sewing!)

Inside that envelope was a white and blue swirly envelope with a pretty dress inside plus another small spotty envelope with a single squirrel holding a heart.

And there was a pocket in the grass, ready to put the little squirrel in!

It was such a sweet and imaginative card!  He really does have a great gift for something unusual.

It was a great way to spend some hours (about 4!) on a Saturday night and the table is still strewn, ready to make some other cards at some point!

What do you think?

A Valentines Day card

Here's the quick card I made for CBC this year.

It was about 11.30pm last night when I remembered what the date was and headed into the Garage to my craft shelves to see if anyone captured my attention.

A lilac card caught my eye and then some red corrugated card.  I rooted around for my heart-punch and then spotted a Persephone Books bookmark and some outline sticks.  With the aid of some double-sided tape that this became the card above. 

Simple and quick and can also be used as a bookmark!

Did you make a card?

Do share if so!

x