Tuesday Tutorials

This week's amazing tutorial is brought to you by one of our newest DT members, Elly Burian! Oh yeah, we're super excited to see what she has in store for us this week...looks like fun!
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ever since i was a little girl i have loved miniature things. whether it be the dollhouse that i spent hours with, arranging and rearranging, to the silly tchotchkes that came out of bubblegum machines in the 80s. so when i heard of something smaller than ATCs that people were trading, i had to look into it!

inchies are fantastic and very versatile. you can trade them, like ATCs, tuck them inside an envelope for a sweet treat, add them to cards or layouts for a special new look.

first, gather your materials. there are two great things about inchies. one, they are perfect for using up scraps of great paper that you just can't bear to throw away but otherwise don't necessarily use.


two, they're wonderful to use any smaller stamps you may have in sets that aren't big enough for cards on their own. Hero Arts has a bunch of the smaller sets that are perfect for making little scenes with inchies! and Inkadinkado makes a few sets specifically FOR inchies!



also great to have at hand are glue dots for a bit of dimension and pop dots for even more dimension. my small paper cutter is also always in use when i am making inchies.

inchies can be stamped and cut, or cut and stamped. this means that you can create your artwork first and then trim your piece to an inch square, or you can cut your paper to an inch square first and then decorate it! as a tip, what might help to frame your little works of art would be to take a piece of cardboard or even thick cardstock, get a 1" square punch and create a little frame that you can peek through to see how your inchies are taking shape! a 1" square punch is obviously the easiest way to cut out inchies as well!

paper piecing is one of my favorite techniques to use with inchies. first you stamp onto your base paper, usually the inchie itself. then, you re-stamp it onto a coordinating paper and cut the pieces out and pop dot them onto the base image! in this case, the pieces are often quite tiny, so it's best to have some precision scissors to work with. it gives the inchies extra character and dimension.

inchies add the perfect touch to a card. they can be plain, without stamping or other decoration, to showcase some gorgeous paper.


or, you can use one inchie to set a little scene for a great greeting.



i also love to incorporate them into layouts – they are especially great for titles.



at work, at home, anywhere. fast and easy - good for a creativity boost or massaging your mojo. to keep your creative juices flowing, set five minutes aside and do one every day! i even did two at work today with materials lying on my desk!



they're perfect for a short scrapping session, and you can incorporate them into a layout or card if you have more time. you can show off the paper itself or the many stamps you may have, if you're like me. all in all, they're wonderful little pieces of art to create and share.