Gettin' Made: Read All About It!

It's book review time again, crafters! This week we're taking a look at three titles from Chronicle Books--Paper+Craft: 25 Charming Gifts, Accents, and Accessories to Make From Paper by Minhee & Truman Cho, Every Day's a Holiday by Heidi Kenny, and Silhouette Art by Vana Chupp. Plus, enter to win your very own free copy of Silhouette Art courtesy of Chronicle Books!

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After the jump, check out some of the projects from these great papercrafting titles and enter to win.

Some of my family members joined me in trying crafts out from these books. First up, we looked through Paper+Craft: 25 Charming Gifts, Accents, and Accessories to Make from Paper by Minhee and Truman Cho. My mom-in-law Carole paged through the book and decided to try out one of the keepsake boxes on page 67:

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We were impressed with the templates for this book that you download from the Chronicle Books website--it makes it so easy to print out just the projects you're working on, which saves on paper! Carole also mentioned that having the templates available online probably saved on printing costs, making the book that much more affordable. Carole found the directions for the keepsake box easy and enjoyable to follow, and she made this great Christmas-themed one.

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If you're like me and you have a plethora of fun crafting papers, making the flag banner project on page 17 is an awesome way to quickly put some of them to use for party time fun. I made lots of different triangles from different patterned papers, cutting them in two slightly different sizes for more interest. Assembly of the banner was super easy to do, as well, making this a really fun project for all ages.

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Don't let anyone tell you stripes and stars and polka dots don't go together--as long as your patterns have similar colors in them, they'll have a really festive feel when they hang together for your party.

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My husband Josh was inspired by the Moustache Drink Toppers project on page 105, and made a quick milk moustache for our newborn son Phil:

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We all found this book to be chock full of great papercrafting projects for all ages--some projects are quicker than others, and some (like the Beehive Garden Stakes on page 113) would be really great executed in a heartier material than paper for use outside as well.