Christi's Creative Crew: Did You Know?

Did you know that you can make your own little dots for your cards?
Stampin' Up! sells CANDY DOTS! LOVE THEM! they come in every color family: Subtles, Brights, Regals & Neutrals. Each color family sheet has 10 each of 10 colors so do your math - that is 100 candy dots for only $6.00 per color family.

And they also offer the BRAD BASES in case you need a brad for your card or project. These Brad Bases are also great for the Basic Rhinestones and Pearls.

Another option which I LOVE are the WHITE PERFECT ACCENTS. These all white accents come on a sheet of 75 for $5.00 and there are 25 each of 3 different sizes (3/16", 1/4" and 5/16"). These are GREAT because you can color these all white accents pieces with a sharpie marker to make them any color you want. - PERFECT!

So why do I need to make my own little dots for my cards? I don't - not really, but I like to play around with different ideas and when someone showed me this idea on Pinterest I wanted to give them a try. Have you heard of Perler Beads?

These are the fun little plastic beads that kids can make cute designs and then you heat them with your iron to melt them all together. I used them a lot when I was doing day care (until a couple of the kids decided to stick them up their noses and had to go to the Doctor to get them removed - yea - really!)
I headed to the local Dollar Store to pick up a small set to give them a try. IT WORKED!! How fun are these cute dots??!! You put them on parchment paper in your toaster oven for 12 min at 450 degrees - that's it!!

EXCEPT: don't put them too close together or they will melt together...

What to do? Oh yeah - this is the fun part... I made some 3x3 note cards for Gracie's lunch bag.

I was on a roll - I decided that if I could get all Black beads that would be GREAT and save me some money maybe...NOT! I purchased these individual bags

My first try: the plastic was of a higher quality so they did not melt enough to get rid of the center circle. I also left them on the parchment paper too long and I could not peel them off easily so this (thankfully small) batch ended up in the trash.

My second attempt: still did not melt enough but I thought I might be able to use them somehow. You need to scrape them off your parchment paper after 1-2 minutes maximum or they will stick like my first batch did.

I didn't learn my lesson, I guess, because I went back and bought some White Perler Beads. I thought that because the depth of the wall of the bead was less in the white bead than in the black bead it would work fine - NOPE! still have a hole, (sorry no picture) just not as big as the black shown above, and they did not stay white-white, they discolored a slight bit to more of a Very Vanilla color. I think I can still use these at some point but I am disappointed in not being able to buy bulk single colors. I'm not sure I want to invest in the ginormous tub of beads which may or may not work. I do, however, LOVE the 2 cute little cards I made for Gracie.

Don't forget about the 15% off all stamp sets through Friday October 23rd.