Panic and Freak Out: Cute Frankenstein Paperweight for Halloween

With Halloween a little more than a month away, I wanted to post a fun design that will grab lots of attention at the office.  It's so cute, it may end up staying on your desk long after all the little ghouls and goblins have gone home.

I used our Heirloom Rectangle paperweight kit for this project because it has a display area that will accommodate dimensional items.  You'll also need a few embellishment stickers and a sheet of decorative paper to use as the background.

The paper I chose for the background has "Now Panic and Freak Out" written across it in several different fonts.  (The reverse side reads, "Keep Calm and Carry On")  I thought the simple, black and white design would be a great base for the colorful stickers I used in this project.  (Paper:  Recollections 'Keep Calm' - Available at Michaels)

The dimensional stickers (Recollections 224552 - Available at Michaels) are made up of three layers separated by foam tape. Because they were a little too thick to fit inside the paperweight, I removed the foam tape from the back of each sticker and applied them to the background with glue.  This reduced the thickness of the stickers by a few millimeters.

When I'm working with dimensional items, I prefer to adhere the finished mounting board to the adhesive side of the paperweight kit's bottom pad, as shown above.   This is because the dimensional stickers prevent the mounting board from laying flat on the bottom of the paperweight, making it difficult to keep everything centered while applying the bottom pad.

The last step in completing your design is to apply the adhesive pad (artwork attached and facing down) to the bottom of your paperweight.


If you have any questions or comments regarding this project, or if you need help with a project of your own, please leave a comment.  We're more than happy to help.

Old Fashioned Button Paperweight

 I love using buttons in my designs because they're available so many different colors, shapes, sizes, and materials.  You also have a choice between new buttons and vintage.

For this project I used self-adhesive buttons that were part of wonderful embellishment kit (50-00376 Mother of Pearl Notion Kit) produced by Jolee's Boutique and inspired by the vintage notions sold by French General.  (You can visit French General's website at FrenchGeneral.com.) The 25-piece kit includes self-adhesive buttons, horseshoes, and other lovely, little trinkets perfect for paperweight projects.

The paperweight kit being used is our Heirloom Dome

The first step is to create a background on which to place the buttons.  I chose a black and white calico print paper that was applied to the adhesive side of the paperweight kit's round mounting board. (Paper: MME #LF2104 Sunshine 24 Sheet Paper Pad).  The excess paper was trimmed with scissors.

A rose made from red ribbon was applied to the center of the mounting board with hot melt glue.  The self-adhesive buttons were placed in random pattern around the rose.  In order to keep the design looking clean, the button holes were turned so they faced the center.

The finished mounting board was applied to the adhesive side of the paperweight kit's bottom pad.

To finish, the bottom pad was applied to the base of the paperweight.


If you have any questions or comments regarding this project, or if you need help with a project of your own, please leave a comment.  We're more than happy to help.