Cards on the Cheap

Everyone's trying to cut back on expenses these days-I'm no exception. I made these two cards after seeing a baby card by Kim Kesti. Love the way she combined chipboard (one of my favorite products) with vellum (a product that scares me a little.) Not only are these little cards cost-effective, they're also adorable.

I'm going to share a couple of cost-cutting strategies for making cards. They're all painless and give you super-cute results.

The first is to make your cards smaller. Mini cards are adorable and easy. These cards I'm sharing are 4" square, so you can get four cards from a 12X12 sheet of cardstock. Cover the from with a scrap of patterned paper-I used 4" square pieces, but you could also use a smaller size square and leave a margin around the entire card.

The second way to stretch you buck is to use papers that you already have. Not a new idea, but this one has a twist. I punched a scalloped circle from a piece of ugly patterned paper (you know you have some!) and adhered it to the center of the card, ugly-side-down. It will look like you used white cardstock. Layer a square piece of vellum over the top and attach with brads or eyelets in each corner.

The third way to stretch your card budget is to use minimal embellishments. You don't need ten layers on your card front to make it look spectacular. Adhere a chipboard shape (these are Miss Elizabeth's from Dollar Tree-there were 15-20 different shapes for $1) over the vellum on your card. You could also use a button, a flower, or any other slightly dimensional accent.

Finally, use stamps. They are a little more expensive than embellishments sometimes, but can be used over and over again. Sentiment stamps are my favorite because you can mix and match them with any embellishments, not just other stamps.