How to Make Spinner Cards

You can find a lot of creative ways to customize cards. Making your own cards allows you to add special touches for the person that you are giving one to, and in many cases it is often much cheaper to make these special cards than it is to buy them already made. A spinner card is one type of card that can definitely show someone that you put a lot of care into making a card that is just right. Spinner cards are a type of card where a shape spins on a string, and is separate from the main piece of the card.

Things You'll Need

• Cardstock (mixed colors as desired)
• Photos (optional)
• Shaped craft punches, two sizes (desired shapes)
• Scissors
• Pencil (optional)
• Ruler (optional)
• Double sided craft tape, acid free
• Yarn or string (any color)
• Decorations

Instructions

1. Use the ruler, pencil and scissors to mark and cut a piece of cardstock as the background piece. This will be the piece that the entire completed pieces will be attached to. You can choose a rectangular type card where the measurements could be 12 inches long by 6 inches wide.

2. Use the ruler, pencil and scissors again to mark and cut a base piece of cardstock that is slightly smaller than your background piece. For a rectangular card, you would choose either a smaller rectangle (6 inches x 3 inches) or a square (4 inches x 4 inches). Choose sizes that will allow the background cardstock to stick out from behind the base piece.

3. Use your smaller craft punch and two pieces of scrap cardstock (or one piece of cardstock and one photo) to cut out two spinner pieces. Turn your punch over so that you can line up the cutting hole with the area that you want to punch out, which is especially helpful when working with photos.

4. Decorate your spinner as desired, using craft supplies.

5. Apply one or two pieces of double sided craft tape to the reverse side of one of the spinner pieces. Cut a piece of yarn or string about 4 inches long (adjust length to suit the size of your spinner) and center the yarn on top of the tape. Press the reverse side of the other spinner piece to the tape to join the pieces.

6. Place the base piece in the desired location on top of the background piece. Use the larger craft punch to make a hole through both pieces at the same time.

7. Place two pieces of doubled sided craft tape above and below the hole that you made on the base piece. Place the spinner in the center of the hole and press the yarn or string into the two pieces of tape. Trim the excess string.

8. Place four pieces of double sided craft tape into each of the corners. Flip the base piece with the spinner over and press it to the background piece, lining up the holes. You can now decorate the rest of the card as desired.

Tips & Warnings

• Example sizes for your craft punches could include a 1-inch for the large hole and a 1/2-inch for the small hole. Your sizes will vary, but one needs to be larger than the other.

• You can experiment with many different shapes for the background of your card, as well as the cutouts and spinners.

• You can use just about anything to decorate your cards, from paint and stencils to 3D pieces and embellishments.

• If desired, you can add a photo to one side of your spinner and a solid or printed design to the other side.

• You can also use unflavored dental floss if you don't have access to yarn or string.

References

• Scrapjazz: Sensational Spinner Cards

Resources

• Splitcoaststampers: Spinner Card
• Martha Stewart: Spinning Greeting Cards