Tired of wasting Cardstock? Complete projects in Design Space

Over the past few weeks, I have created beautiful giant cardstock flowers for the nursery. They look great, but my gosh, so much cardstock is wasted! I shop the sales at Hobby Lobby and Michael’s and was able to get the cardstock on sale, but still, cardstock is expensive. I’m the queen of repurposing, my husband is a bourbon drinker and cigar smoker and low and behold there is a market for selling empty bourbon bottles and empty cigar boxes on Etsy! So, up those went on my Etsy store. I also created outdoor tiki torches with Bourbon bottles and those help keep the bugs away in the muggy Chicagoland summers. You see my point; I had to find a way to use these cardstock scraps! I looked through all the cardstock projects in Design space to determine the most simplistic designs where your time will be well spent, fit the cardstock scrap size and could be used the most in a variety of ways.

Picnic Labels using Cardstock

In Cricut Design space, search for Picnic Labels under Projects. Instead of using the pen color and cardstock colors the creator recommended, I just used three colors from my scraps. The creator recommends adding ribbon and placing around a napkin. The outcome is adorable, but I could see for an indoor dinner, you could use these for seating assignments. The project took me less than 30 minutes to complete.

Oh Happy Day – Gift Tag using Cardstock

Now this one could not be more simple. If you typically find yourself without a tag for a gift bag, this is the perfect simple solution. In Cricut Design space, search for Oh Happy Day – Gift Tag under Projects. This will pull up a variety of gift tags. All of these tags are great for using scraps. . This craft uses very little cardstock. You will need a piece that is 3×6 and another piece that is 4×4. With leftover flower scraps you will have enough cardstock to make a nice stash of these gift tags for the future! This craft took me less than 10 minutes.

Graduation Cap Cake Topper

We are nearing graduation season! Instead of purchasing a cake or gift topper, use your cardstock scraps for this design. I used the colors I had on hand versus recommended by the creator. You can also re-size this design in the event you would like to put it on a poster board or another sort of display. Craft took a piece of 3×5, a 2×2 and 3×4. This craft took me ten minutes to complete.

Holiday Place Cards

If you ended up making flowers for a particular themed event, this design is perfect for your cardstock scraps. In Design Space under Projects search for Holiday Place Cards. For a total of 4 place cards, I used two, 4.5×10 pieces of cardstock. In this design you swap out the names on the cards, cut the design and then use adhesive to create the layered look. If you want to make the cards look perfect, I recommend curating the letters so they attach instead of the individual letters. There are so many great tutorials on YouTube on how to curate letters in Design Space. If you just need a quick refresh, detach the name from the card, highlight the name, click on advanced in the toolbar and click ungroup to letters. After you make edits, group the letters, weld the name, and then attach the name back to to the card. If you do this, budget to spend an extra two minutes per place card. Without curating the names, to complete four place cards it took me less than ten minutes.

Just one More Page Bookmark

I really liked this simple bookmark. Whenever giving a book as a gift, add a bookmark, when sharing an old book, add a bookmark. I did, however, make a few customizations to this design. I started with the Just One More Page Bookmark under the Design Space Project section. In this design “just one more page” is a cut-out that you then adhere to the bookmark. Instead, I added pen text using the babette font, welded the words and then attached the text to the bookmark. I also used the cardstock scrap versus recommended materials. You could also add saying such as; No Spoilers Please, Do not Disturb, or In the Zone. Even with the edit from cut out to pen, this bookmark took me less than ten minutes. Now that I have the template all set, I could cut a dozen more and have them ready in two minutes.

Create your own card

There are so many elaborate cards on Design Space, but telling someone you are thinking of them, wishing a happy birthday or thank you does not need to be an elaborate process. This is also a great way to use your cardstock scrap. The larger scrap pieces are used for the actual card and then smaller scraps for some of the design items on the front. I wanted to keep this option under fifteen minutes, and therefore worked through a basic Happy Birthday card. If you create the envelope yourself, budget another 10-15 minutes.

Take your largest piece of scrap, I recommend at least 4.5×9 and that will be your card. Create a rectangle in design space and add a score line at the half way point.
Add a text box, select a writing font, under cut select pen and craft your inside card message. If you do not have pens for your Cricut or would prefer to hand write your message, this step is irrelevant.
From the picture section in Design Space, select a nice saying such as Happy Birthday with a cake or balloons.
Now if you would like an envelope, you will need to use a full sheet of new cardstock. Unless you have a scrap piece that is 2/3 a sheet. The easiest way is to find an existing card design under projects, delete the card, keep the envelope and resize to the size of card you just created. If you want to spend a little more time, you can create the envelope yourself in Design Space. You will have a rectangle the size of your card, and then create circles or triangles to fold in on the sides, up on the bottom and down from the top. The side inward folds on each side should be 1/3 of your card width. The up fold should be anywhere from 5/8 of your card to 3/4 of your card. The down fold will overlap the up fold. I recommend 1/2 of your card length.

Creating your own card with cardstock scraps

More to come with using Cardstock scrap

Design space regularly updates their library and I will continue to hunt for simple, scrap size, low time consuming projects. In the meantime, if there are other Design Space projects that you use for your scraps, please share those in the comment!

Best!

Emily M