Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Diva Wine Charms Tutorial

If you've ever visited my blog or know me personally, you'll know that wine is one of my loves! I enjoy a glass of red wine many nights while I'm stamping. I often give wine as gifts when I go to dinner somewhere, also. When I have girlfriends over or have parties, wine is always served. One problem we always come across; which glass is mine? Wine charms are the perfect answer to this. I'm going to show you how to make your own wine charms with a few readily available craft items. These make great hostess gifts, along with a bottle of wine. Make some now and you'll be all ready for the holidays!

Here you can see how the charm looks on the stem of a wine glass. For non wine drinkers, they can be used on the handles of mugs, too.

You'll need shrink plastic to get started. Cut your shrink plastic to the desired shape. I used my circle shaped nestabilities to cut the plastic. Scissors work fine also.

Next, stamp your images onto the rough side of the shrink plastic. I find Staz-on ink works best for this. The up close image uses Wendy, one of the Rubber Romance Divas. The other Divas I used for this set of charms include: Babs, Diva Artist, Diva Chef, Lulu, and Jane. You can check out the Rubber Romance Divas here. The Divas are perfect for this project, they make such fun and sassy wine charms. Your girlfriends will love picking out a charm to use, that most closely represents them.

After stamping your images, color them in. You color on the rough side of the shrink plastic. I used Prisma color pencils and Sakura stardust pens for my coloring.

Punch a hole in the plastic before shrinking. Shrink them according to package instructions. I like to do mine in the oven, but you can also use a heat tool. Don't walk away from the oven, they shrink pretty fast. Don't worry if they look all curled up, they will flatten out, just give them a little more time.

This is how they look after shrinking. They shrink to about one quarter of the original size.

Add a jump ring to the pre-punched hole in each charm. Jump rings are found in the jewelry making section of craft stores.

Thread the charm and some beads on a wire hoop earring. Here is the whole set together. I usually make six or eight as a set.

I tie a ribbon through all of them to hold them together, then on to packaging.

I packaged mine in a little cello bag with a topper. I computer generated the words, so the recipient would immediately know what they were. Added some prima flowers and bling for sparkle.

Thanks for stopping by today. Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial and will try it out!

8 comments:

  1. Seriously, I love this website! thanks so much!!

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  2. I am going to the craft store tomorrow to get my supplies for this, what a fantastic idea!

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  3. I agree with everyone - this is a fabulous gift idea!! Perfect timing for the holidays, Kathy!

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  4. They are fabulous!So nice tutorial,You have done great job,Thank,s for great post.
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