A fun metal embossing project

"[One of] the important things to keep in mind about children's crafts are that... they should be given work well within the ability of their age range so that they are able to do it well and not sloppily."
Charlotte Mason in Modern English Page 316

For this project you will need:

• A metal foil sheet to emboss (you can buy these through DickBlick-see the bottom of this post for more information.)


• A stack of old newspapers or magazines


• A pencil


• Sharpies or other permanent markers


• Scissors


• Cardstock


• Tape

1. Carefully cut the metal sheet so that it will fit on the front of your card. I cut mine into a 4" square to go on the front of a 8 1/2"x 11" piece of cardstock folded in half. Be very careful the edge of the metal sheet can be very sharp. If you have young children you may want to do this for them!

2. Place the metal square on top of a stack of old newspapers or magazines. Using the pencil draw the design you want to emboss onto the square. Leave about 1/4" of a border around the edge. If you are going to write anything, be sure to write it in reverse to that it will be legible when you turn it over to the front.
3. Once you have finished your design, turn the metal over. Your design should be raised on the front.
4. Use Sharpies or other permanent markers to color in the front of your metal sheet.

5. You can either tape the edges of the metal sheet onto the front of your card. (Maybe you could use colored masking tape or something else like that.) Or you can cut a hole slightly smaller than the size of your metal square (I cut a 3 1/2" square on the front of my card) and tape the square to the inside of the card with the embossed image in the frame. You could even tape a piece of paper over that encasing the metal sheet between the cardstock and the paper. (You don't want to leave any edges because the metal can be sharp.)

Here is my brother's embossed metal square.

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You can purchase the metal sheets like the ones I used for this project from DickBlick. You can find them here. I used the 36 guage aluminum sheets. If you have any questions feel free to email me.

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I also have quite a few Hearts and Trees Spring Kits still available for sale, so be sure to hop over to my blog post about them if you haven't already. I am hearing a lot of good things from families who have already received theirs in the mail.