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Tag: handmade cards

A Word Of Thanks To All Of My Crafting Friends at Joans Craft World

I wanted to take a minute and thank all of you for your wonderful support and encouragement you have given me throughout the year.  While Joans Craft Worlds blog is alot of fun, and a great way to share my handmade cards and scrapbooking creations with all of you, You my Crafting Friends are the ones that really make it all worthwhile.

I want you to know how much I appreciate each and every one of you that takes the time to visit Joans Craft World blog on a regular basis, and how I especially appreciate it when you take the time to leave a comment.  It always puts a smile on my face when I read your comments – let’s face it, it makes me feel good to know that you enjoy my creations and my crafting tips that I have learned along the way, and that you enjoy stopping by for a visit…so please keep it up, don’t stop.

I am planning some fun new things for the New Year.  I see videos in 2010 for Joans Craft World to make things more fun along with some other crafty things.  It’s going to be a great year for all of us.

Wishing all of you the Happiest Christmas and a Crafty New Year!

joanscraftworldsantabear



JoansCraftWorld now Donating Cards for a Cause called Operation Write Home

I found this website that I think is the most heart felt site that I have seen. It is called Operation Write Home.  It is an organization that takes handmade cards that we the card makers make and send them to our troops, so that they can write to their family and loved ones at home.  They recently changed their name from Cards for Heroes.

When I went to the site and saw the pictures of our military men and women holding up cards from “us” with such smiles on there faces, it really touched me like never before.  I guess I have been in my little world enjoying my freedom, but not remembering why I am free.  It’s because of all of our military out there in the middle of nowhere or should I say “hell” fighting for my and our freedom.
It might sound crazy but now I feel that I have a small part in helping them connect with there families by being part of Operation Write Home.

operationwritehome

I am in the process of making a lot of cards to send to Operation Write Home so they in return can mail them out to our troops.  And I am going to say this to all of you so you can hold me accountable, I will continue to make/send cards till all of our troops are safely home with there families.  There I said it and now I have to do it.  And it’s not like I don’t like making cards, that is my passion and now my passion has a cause behind it.

So you may be asking yourself, why is Joan writing about this? Because if you are a card maker like me and want to help our soldiers stay connected with there families and loved ones, take part in this great cause.  Remember, there are no Hallmark stores for them to get a card.  Consider yourself the piece of the puzzle that get our soldiers connected to home.

Go and visit the site now, and get all the details.  I hope you feel as good as I do, and join in on this wonderful good deed and help send Cards for Heroes.

A Cricut Project Using the Hello Kitty Greetings Cricut Cartridge

I needed to make a birthday card for my niece Nicole.  She really loves cats, so I decided to use my Hello Kitty Greetings Cricut Cartridge for her card.  There was so many cute kitty’s to choose from, but I decided to use the one with the balloons so that I could Rubber Stamp some sentiments on.

I cut the Hello Kitty on my Cricut Expression Machine.  I set my size to 5″, and you can see it was the perfect size.  I added some happy birthday wishes and a candle and present with “perfectly clear stamps” and black color box pigment ink.  I also used Star Dust Stickles around the bow and clothing  for a little sparkle.

hellokittycard50

Make it a Great Day and don’t forget to leave time to Craft!

PRICING TIPS: WHAT TO CHARGE FOR YOUR HANDMADE CRAFT

What to charge for your Handmade Craft
Now that you want to sell your handmade crafts, your big decision is how much you want to charge for it. There are many formulas out there as guidelines but remember in the end it is all up to you how much you want to charge.
One Formula that I use is:
1. Decide how much you want to be paid per hour when working on your “craft”.
2. Then multiply this hourly rate by the number of hours a week that you spend making this “craft”
3. Write down that figure. This will be your weekly cost of labor. So if you need to make $10 per hour working 40 hours per week the cost of labor would be $400.
4. Now you need to calculate the total cost of supplies that you need to make one finished product.
5. Then see how many products you can make in one week.
6. Then you multiply the cost of Supplies per piece by the number of products make in a week. (If your cost of materials per piece is $2 and you can make 100 products a week, the figure would be $200.00)
7. Now add this figure to your weekly labor costs. (in our example that would be $400 + $200 = $600.00
8. Now divide this figure by the number of products that you produce in a week. So $600.00 labor/materials divided by 100 finished products a week would be $6.00 per piece.
9. If you will be wholesaling your product, you then multiply the per piece number by two. This would then give you a retail price of $12.00 per piece.
If the resulting price that you get is more than a similar product on the market, you may need to reduce it by cutting the hourly price. You can do this by using less expensive materials or by not being a “Total Perfectionist” and increase your production time. This concept goes both ways. If you see that your price is a lot less than similar products you may want to raise your price.
Just a little Tip:
Let’s say that you are making a Handmade Greeting Cards. If you use adhesive tabs to put your card together, keep in mind that you do not need the entire 1000 tabs for one card that you make, so you will need to calculate how many tabs that you need and divide it by the total cost of your 1000 tab package. This also goes for embossing powder, how many handmade greeting cards can you make with one container of embossing powder, same goes for embossing pens, glitter, etc.
*And this final cost per piece that we figured out was only for labor and materials. You may also consider adding into that price the cost for marketing your product. That could be the fee for your craft show, online selling, web sites, etc.
With all this pricing info that was just shared, just remember to:

Have a Great Day and don’t forget to leave time to Craft!

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