Father's Day Shrinky Dinks -3 ways

"Hand"made Father's Day Gifts for the Father's in your life!

I love Shrinky Dinks, don't you? We used to make them all the time as kids. I guess there was somthing bad in them. But now they are made sans the bad stuff (I hope). For my son's birthday party last month, we made Shrinky Dinks. Since then I've been renewed in my love for the dinks. My husband had dropped by to get me some Shrinky Dinks for the party. He came back with this PRINTABLE stuff! I was thrilled until I saw how much it cost. It was about $11 for one pack and he picked up three packs for me. Eeek. I returned two, but held onto one because I had to try it out. I found the regular Shrinky Dinks for the party.
Just a refresher for you incase you haven't shrunk anything since the 70's your childhood last year. Remember the edges come out sharp. Always curve your corners unless you intend your project to poke someone's eye out. Punch any holes into it BEFORE you bake them. If you forget, you will have to do something drastic like pull your drill out to make a hole after you have baked them. (Not like I'm talking from experience...there was only one little kid's project that missed getting a hole punch before baking.)

I can't wait to do this for Christmas...just wait and see...I punched all the way around some of them. (This one was not a printable one. With the regular kind, you want to do your design or words backwards so that the top is glossy when it is all baked and shrunk.)


I wanted some magnets. I printed family pictures on these so I'm not sharing the fronts. I wanted the first to look like lace so I cut the edges and punched it to look lacy. The second one I threaded ribbon through it to give it a little detail. I used some trusty E-6000 glue to stick my super strong magnets on.


Did you know you could use the hole punched holes to CROCHET AROUND your project? I LOVE!! I backed this with a little felt and some nice glue, and then glued a magnet on the back. Seriously I'm thinking about Christmas ornaments made like this!

Let your creative juices flow and you will probably fall back in love with the Dinks as I have!

Anjeanette

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Katrina here

My boys love this stuff. Can you believe I went to 2 different stores and they didn't know what "Shrinky Dinks" were?! We are talking a big chain craft store and they didn't know what I was talking about. They looked at me like I grew a second head. LOL Turns out they did have some but they already had patterns on them. They were labed as "Shrink Art." I did eventually find some plain Shrinky Dinks and another craft store.

When the girls suggested a 3 way make with Shrinky Dinks, I wasn't sure what I could come up with. Some times I never know until I start "playing with an idea." Around here we have been playing around with doing hand prints. For the kid's first year I inked their feet almost every month and stamped them on paper(I wrote their names and dates on the backs). After that first year I switched to doing their hand prints every few years.

I started by inking up a hand on each of my boys and transfering their hand print onto a sheet of Shrinky Dink. I then wrote their names and the year along side their hands. I cut around the hands leaving a gernerous border. Note: Do not try to cut out around the fingers. They will curl and stick together and look like your child broke a finger. ;) So these hands are my take 2. I used two 5x8 sheets for the hands.

Then I used one whole 5x8 sheet to write out the "Daddy...." saying and rounded only the top two corners.

For the base of my little desk plaque I used a fourth 5x8 sheet and had my oldest son write "Happy Father's Day" and his name. Then I helped my 5 year old write his name. He still wants hand over hand help when writing. I then rounded all 4 corners.

I shrank all my pieces and then glued them together. The two hands on the top of the saying and I used bamboo skewers to help hold up the upright plate while it dried and to add a bit of something extra.

I wish you could see this in person. No matter how many pictures I took of it, they just don't do it justice. I love that you can see their finger prints and all the lines in their palms. They are not actual size anymore but still you know they are their hand prints.

If I were able to find the printable stuff, I would totally make these with the kids pictures on them.


---------------
Rebecca here with my version of a Father's Day gift using shrinky dink. For me, I didn't have to think up a way to use shrinky dink. I had already been inspired to use it, from Anjeanette's Son's Birthday Party where we used it! I had this gift in mind since then.


1. Trace kids hands onto a page of the shrinky dink paper. Cut out handprints. (As Katrina mentioned, cutting out the individual fingers will cause your fingers to curl and you can have problems with them sticking together. Thankfully mine opened back up when they were done baking.)

2. Decorate your handprints. I had colored pencils ready for my kids to color their handprints. They all decided to leave them just black and white. I did talk my kids into signing their names in the palm and then write their age on the thumb.
3. Punch a large hole in the bottom of the hand (holes shrink up tiny, and they can even disappear completely if they were too small)

4. Put your handprints on a cookie sheet and cook according to directions on your package of shrinky dinks. Make sure to leave space between them so they don't stick to each other, as they do curl up a lot during the baking process (and then they flatten back out).
5. A variation on this would be to turn the hands into a 3D version. When you take these out of the oven, you can still manipulate them for a very short time. These would be super cute made up into the sign language form for "I Love You". You would just bend the middle 2 fingers into the palm. They will stay hardened at this point. However, since I had 3 handprints going on this project, I needed them to lie flat with each other.
I really love how these turned out!

Lined up next to each other I found something out. 2 of my kids hand sizes are now the same size! My youngest is getting to be the same size as my middle! What a fun fact to find out! Another interest part of this project for us was that we have to do it again. My Son wants his own handprint for himself. I'm hoping this time I can talk them into coloring them. However, their Daddy will probably prefer this in the black and white that they decided on.

Here is my finished project; a key chain! Their Daddy has always loved having pictures of the kids on his key chain. So, I knew this was a project he might actually use (especially since the colors aren't crazy like I initially wanted them!).

Now my problem is keeping this project a secret from Dad! My kids are pretty good at keeping a secret...I'm not known for it. ;)

Rebecca