ribbon butterflies (and using up those ribbon scraps)

Do you keep your ribbon scraps? Do you have an overflowing drawer like I do??

Yes, I have a lot of scraps. I used to throw them away but now I keep them for 2 reasons: 1) my daughter likes to go in there & pull out ribbon for her 'projects', and 2) I found a great way to use up those scraps.

I found this idea over on Nicole Magouirk's blog a while back. I love this idea & have made tons of these ribbon butterflies. So here's what you do:

Take your ribbon scraps, Sizzix die, adhesive & scrap cardstock.

Measure the die you're going to use & then cut the cardstock to 1/4" wider on each side. Then apply adhesive to the entire piece...don't skimp!

Layer strips of ribbon on the cardstock. If something doesn't look right to you, just peel it off & place another one. There's no rhyme or reason, just what looks good to you!

Trim the excess ribbon off (it doesn't have to be exact, just makes it easier to run through the machine).

Place your die face down on the die paying attention to which side you want at the top & run through the Sizzix machine.

Can you tell my machine is well loved :) And what you end up with is this:

Cute, huh?! I used this big butterfly to dress up a tag that will probably end up on a gift bag:

Then I made a smaller one for this card:

Card & tag were created using the Truly Scrumptious kit 

along with scraps from my stash

 

You can make whatever shape you want. You can use this to decorate cards, gift bags, whatever. In fact, I made one of the bigger ones last year to add to this decorative printers tray:

More pics of this project here using one of last year's kits.

So use those ribbon scraps :)