Turkey Handprint Trivets

Today I decided to try an idea that was brewing in my head. I cleaned my craft room yesterday because there has been some craftiness taking place in that space and it was a mess. When I was cleaning I discovered two white ceramic tiles that I had bought a few months back. I originally had a hand-print Christmas tree trivet in mind. However, when I tried it with acrylic paint on the ceramic tile (from Home Depot) the paint didn't adhere well. So I washed the tile clean and it ended up piled under a bunch of other stuff until yesterday. I needed an idea for my MOPS group blog post, so I decided to do hand-print turkeys using scrapbook paper and Mod Podge. I think they turned out really, really cute.



Below you can see most of the supplies used. I traced the boys' hands on the wrong side of some scrapbook paper and cut them out. Instead of doing each "feather" in a different paper, I decided to use a brown plaid paper I really liked for the whole tail. I used my star punch to make feet and a beak (I cut off a star point for the beak) and my heart punch (cut in half) for the wattle. I used a regular size hole punch to punch out an eye. The photo shows everything laid out on the tile before I Mod-Podged it. That's why it looks kind of crooked.







The first step was to spread a thin layer of Mod Podge all over the clean, dry tile with a foam brush. Then I laid out the paper pieces and brushed another layer of Mod Podge over the top. After that coat was dry I added stickers to spell each boy's name and the year. Then I put another 2 coats of Mod Podge over the top again to really adhere the stickers. The photo below shows one tile which is mostly dry and the other one still wet. If you try this and have never used Mod Podge, don't worry, it dries clear.

I think these turned out SOOOOO cute. I am so happy with them. I will add little felt circles (like the kind you put under furniture) to the back corners. I think I'll also pick up some little plate easels at Hobby Lobby and display these on a shelf in an upright position. They will be fun to pull out each year. I was barely able to fit my 9 year olds' hand on one, so I'm glad I did it this year. He might be too big next year to do this!

The photo below shows last year's Thanksgiving hand-print craft. I used fabric paint to do "hand turkeys" of each boy and freezer paper stencilled the words in the middle. The pillow is made out of burlap. CLICK HERE for a link to the post describing this project.

Here is a peek...........

...........at the cards I am sending out for my Lent project. I made these up last night using a diagonal double pocket card tutorial I found at Robin's Craft Room. These are SO easy to make and turned out very cute (in my opinion). I wanted a card that had little pockets so I could slip a bookmark into it. I am sending these out to about 40 women who have impacted my life in a positive way (40 women for 40 days of Lent). I wanted each person to have something to keep to remember that I appreciate them and thought the bookmarks were a practical idea. In the back diagonal pocket I will insert a hand-written letter from me. I used my punches to add a little matching detail to the envelopes. I think it's fun to get something in a decorative envelope. I haven't "played" with paper for a long time and I really enjoyed it. I only made 5 cards so far, but my plan is to finish the rest soon so my evenings during Lent can just be focused on writing the messages instead of making the cards.


I found the gorgeous papers for these cards at Hobby Lobby. I bought this paper pad and this one. For this particular type of card, you have to have paper that is printed on both sides. I used 12X12 inch paper and cut it down to 8X10 for the cards. I was able to use the excess paper for the bookmarks. I embellished them with some little silk flowers and buttons. (Flowers were also from Hobby Lobby in the scrapbooking section.) These cards are seriously so easy to make. The link I included in the above paragraph has a YouTube video tutorial embedded in it. After you watch it, you will easily be able to replicate the card. You can even experiment on recycled paper to try out the technique.