Friday, February 26, 2010

UHU Review along with a tutorial

I received another UHU Sample to review. This month's sample included the glue stick and a cute little notebook, along with green paper and foamie shamrock shapes. Even a fun little lady bug.

Well - I opened it and had a brainstorm. I alter lots of notebooks, so the process was familiar to me. I wanted to try something new. I went to my stash and grabbed a foamie star shape. I was thinking about stamping and embossing the foamie.

IT WORKS - TRIAL AND ERROR - MELTED SEVERAL - BUT FINALLY FIGURED IT OUT - at least foamies are inexpensive.

Here is the process.


Stamp your shape and QUICKLY sprinkle with embossing powder. Meaning have everything ready to go. See mine above - stamped and sprinkled.


Hold your shape with something other than your fingers - bought lesson - melting plastic is worse than a glue gun. I used my needle nose pliers.


Here is the part where you thank me for all of my melted ones. Using your heat gun and keeping it moving - start the embossing process. As you see the powder start to melt, move the gun away and let the shape cool off. Go back and forth with the gun until all of the powder is melted.
Remember - "Patience is a virtue."



Here is my finished shamrock piece. NOTE - this is not very durable in applications where the foamie can flex. The powder wants to flake off if the shape is handled and flexed.




Another little trick I discovered - as the embossing occured the shape wanted to cup and curl toward the embossed side. When the embossing is complete, I turn the shape face down on a heat resistant surface and heat the back side - then press flat until it cools. This will help make it flat enough to glue down.


The remaining steps are for the purpose of assembling my UHU sample and reviewing the Glue Stick.

I received the full sized stick. I glued two layers of scrapbook paper to the front of my little journal. The bottom layer was an embossed paper and the edges required more glue than I intially used. Since I was using the large size of the stick, I found it a little tricky to go back and add glue to the edge. (The small UHU stick that I have in my tool box serves that purpose quite well.)


Notice that I punched holes in my top layer of paper.


The sample packet also included a strip of interesting paper. It was almost ribbon like - matte on one side and shiny on the other. I made a permanent book mark for my journal


I used UHU Twist and Glue to attach a lucky coin and shamrock to the tail of the book mark.



Flipped to the inside back cover and glued the shiny side of the paper ribbon to the inside of the journal. Fold the bookmark to hang across a page and peek out the bottom of the journal.




Add charms to the key ring attached to the spiral binding - a lucky rabbits foot and another coin. Then with a play on words based on the sample contents - I labeled my cover with the words "LADY LUCK"



My finished journal and the UHU Glues that I used.
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My product review of the free glue stick that was in my sample. I love UHU glue stick. Have for a long time - I really like the big size that was in my sample - it made quick work of covering the paper for the journal front. I did find that I needed more glue on the edges of the embossed paper, but that is a user detail not a reflection on the glue. I used the glue for the paper - the shiny ribbon and the foam shamrock attaching. It holds all of those items wonderfully. I also used the same glue for some fabric embellishing on a scrapbook page. Loved it for that too. I keep the smaller sized UHU sticks in my tool kit all the time.


Have a great weekend.











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