DIY Wedding Challenge: Save the Date Tags

1) I began by using my "Tag" die for my Sizzix machine. However, you can always make simple tags, cutting them rectangular and use a corner punch to round off the edges! There are also tag punches, like a hole punch, that would work in a larger size.

I measured the die and then designed my Save the Dates on the computer using Photoshop; you can just as easily use Word for something relatively simple. I repeated my design to make the most use of my paper and printed them.

2) Then I ran my pre-printed paper through my die cut machine to create the tags. Again, at this point you can easily cut them out yourself with scissors or a paper trimmer for a nice clean edge.

3) To accent the tags, I heat embossed a favorite design that I have repeated through a lot of my wedding accents. Each tag was slightly different because I used a different part of the stamp.

I never heat embossed before this project, and I learned quickly that patience is a must but the results are well worth it.

You need pigment ink--this is because pigment ink stamp pads are slow drying. There are many methods to embossing, but for a quick and easy heat emboss, use your stamp with the pigment ink; after you've stamped the image onto your paper, cover the stamped image in an embossing powder. You can get a cheap little canister at Jo-Ann's for $3.99.

Dump off the excess embossing powder. Often you'll find bits of powder sticking to the paper. A nice water color paint brush (you know, the cheapo kind) will help you get rid of that. Then you use a heat tool and wait until it melts and gets shiny and run it all along the stamp so it all gets shiny and melted.

Once it starts, it goes pretty quick; don't hover over it too long once it's melted because you'll start to warp the paper! I got my heat tool at Jo-Ann also.

One tip: I tried the glue pads instead of a pigment ink and found that I got a lot of excess embossing powder on the paper with it. Black pigment ink occasionally showed through my gold embossing powder. The best solution was to get a gold pigment ink pad and use the gold embossing powder. That way if the embossing powder didn't completely cover the image, you couldn't tell at all because the ink itself was gold too!

A nice alternative to heat embossing would be coloring the edges of the stamp with a nice accent ink.

4) Finally, I attached a ribbon with quick and easy knot. I inserted these Save the Dates in Christmas cards, expected them to be hung or clipped to fridges easily.