Going back to school can be both exciting and nerve-wracking. One way to ease those first-day-of-school jitters is to take some cute back-to-school photos. And what’s cuter than a First Day of School sign with a dinosaur theme?
Create your own first-day-of-school signs using Canva, a free online design program. We’re creating a dinosaur theme but you can change out the dinosaur for whatever you want.
Watch the video below to learn how to create your own themed First Day of School signs in Canva.
No time to create the dinosaur first day of school signs from scratch?
You can get the Canva template to edit by signing up to my newsletter below. You’ll also get access to my Printable Resource Library which has 100+ printables.
Are you throwing a Halloween party this year? These cute Halloween invitations are a great way to invite guests to a spooky good time.
Here are 5 Halloween party invitations that I’ve created for you to edit yourself easily in Canva.
WHAT IS CANVA?
Canva is a free online design program that makes it easy to create beautiful designs without being a graphic designer.
Canva is so easy to use. They have tons of templates. You can use Canva’s many templates, or you can create your own. You can even buy templates created by other designers.
Today I’m sharing with you 5 Halloween party invitation templates created by me using only graphics from Canva. So you don’t need to browse the internet looking for cute graphics for your party needs. Some of the graphics are free, while others cost $1. You can bypass the $1 charge if you do their 30 days trial. Just cancel before your trial ends.
You can create your invitations, cupcake toppers, straw flags, banners, etc. using Canva.
If you’re familiar with Canva, click on the appropriate link under each image and have fun putting in your party invitation.
For Canva newbies, just scroll down the post to watch my Canva tutorial video.
To use the free Halloween party invitation template, you have to click on the “GET HALLOWEEN INVITATION TEMPLATE” under the picture of the invitation you want.
You will then get a page that looks like this.
Click on the “Use template.” This will open up the invitation template.
Now have fun and put in your party information, change the font, font size, font color, add images (they are called elements in Canva), etc. You can even put in the birthday girl/boy photo. I will show you how to add a photo in the last video.
HOW TO EDIT HALLOWEEN INVITATION TEMPLATE VIDEO
Watch the quick 3 mins video below to edit your invitation. Make the video full-screen to better see the options on the left of Canva. Just over the right corner of the video, click on the four arrow icon. That will make it full-screen.
HOW TO CHANGE THE COLOR SCHEME OF YOUR INVITATION
This video shows you how quickly it is to change the colors of the ghost invitation to fit whatever color-scheme you want. You can change everything from the ghosts’ party hats to the background itself.
Note that you can’t always change the colors to all of Canva’s graphics. If you can click on the graphics and the colors show up on the left top corner then you can change the colors.
HOW TO ADD PHOTO TO YOUR INVITATION
To add a photo into your invitation template, go to GRAPHICS then select FRAME. Choose your frame shape. Arrange it on your invitation.
Resize the frame by dragging on the corners of your frame.
Now it’s time to add your photo or image.
Go to UPLOADS.
Click on UPLOAD AN IMAGE.
Locate your photo on your computer then click OPEN.
The photo should now show up in your UPLOADS on Canva.
Drag that photo into the frame. Double-click on the frame to move your photo around.
Congrats. You got a photo on your invitation!!!
With just a few simple steps, you can create your very own invitation to send out to all of your friends and family. And the best part is, it’s totally free! So what are you waiting for? Get started on your Halloween invite today. Have fun with it – make it as spooky or as cute as you want. The choice is yours!
Have you ever bought a printable from my shop that has tons of white space? Like this giraffe or bunny wall art printable and wish you can personalize it with a name or a quote?
Today, I will show you how to turn my 8×10 giraffe printable into a party welcome sign using a free online design program called, Canva.
WHAT IS CANVA?
Canva is an online design program that lets you create tons of beautiful posters, invitations, pinterest graphics, etc. for free.
There is also a paid version of Canva, called Canva for Work. There is one feature of Canva for Work that I LOVE!!! That one feature is Canva’s ability to resize my 8×10 designs any other size I want, like a poster, an invitation, a bookmark, etc. I will show you how easy it is in my next tutorial.
Also, with Canva for Work you get more free graphic options.
However, the free version is just awesome for doing all your home and party printables.
Please note: You can only use and personalize my printables for your own personal use. Please do not modify it, claim it as your own and then sell it. That would not be so nice of you.
Materials for this project:
My party giraffe printable if you want to follow along. When you get the giraffe PNG file, just right click on the image and choose save image as to save onto your computer.
Watch the video below for quick tutorial on how to turn this giraffe printable into a party welcome sign. There is no sound, but it’s fairly easy to follow along.
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Go to Canva website. Simply fill in the requested information and sign up.
2. Click on custom dimension and enter 8×10 in. That is the size of my nursery wall art. Click on Create new design.
3. It will open up your blank canvas. Go to Upload and Click on Upload an image.
4. Find the giraffe image that was saved on your computer and upload it to Canva. It will show up under the upload an image like in the screenshot below.
5. Now click and drag the giraffe image onto your blank canvas. Once you see the outline of the canvas turn blue unclick your mouse. The image will now fit exactly into the 8×10 canvas. Otherwise, it will just place your giraffe image down a lot smaller and your have to adjust the image yourself.
ADDING ELEMENTS TO YOUR WELCOME SIGN
Lets say you love the giraffe with the party hat, but you want to change the pom pom on top of it.. Here is what you do.
Click on Elements.
You will see tons of elements that are free and some that are paid. If you want, you can filter it for just free elements by typing free and whatever you are looking for in search. If you have the paid version, Canva for Work, you can just click on free crown icon. Canva for Work offers you more freebies that you otherwise would have to pay if you have the free version.
Using the search box type in firework. Click or drag it onto the canvas.
If you don’t like the firework colors, you can change it to fit your party theme by clicking on the current color and changing it to the one you want.
If you want the firework topper as full as mine, copy it 3 times and then layered them on top of each other, rotating them to how you like them and then group them together. The group function is right next to COPY. Doing this will allow you to move all three layers as one!
You can now download or print this out just like this OR you can:
ADD TEXT
You can add text two different ways. One by clicking on Add a heading, Add a subheading, or Add a little bit of body text. The other way is by using the Canva’s font combination. Canva groups two different fonts together that they feel would make your design pop. I love the Happy Birthday combination, which has the Selima and the League Spartan font. if you don’t like it after putting onto your designs you can always change the font.
By the way, the font combination are grouped together. Whatever you type using this font pairing will move together. If you want to move Happy further up and Birthday separately, you need to UNGROUP. This will let you move the two fonts separately.
I added the number 3 to the party hat for a little more personality. Since, I’m only doing a number, I picked Add a heading. Then type the number 3. I can change its size, color, text using the options on the top left corner. Play with all the options available to you.
BONUS
Lets say you find the above still a little bit too simple and what to add more colors and patterns in the background, like the sign below.
Search for confetti in Elements. Change the color of the confetti if you want it to match your party theme.
Now make copies of the confetti and drag it where you want it to go. You might have to play around with placement of the polkdots so it doesn’t cover the party hat or the words. For the words you can always change the position (upper right corner) to be in front of the polkadots.
Do the same for the balloons. Find it in Elements. Copy it to make it across the top of your welcome sign.
Wasn’t that super fun to do?
You made your first cool party printable!
YAY!
If you love this giraffe polkadot welcome sign the way it is, you can download it here and just modify the name. I will omit the name and the number on the hat for you to personalize yourself.
Your work is automatically save onto your Canva account.
If you want to share your design with others, you can click on Share. You get the options of either inviting people to edit or view your designs. The other sharing option is through a link.
If you want to download your finished work onto your computer, you can click the down arrow next to the Share button.
I normally save my design in PDF Print.
If you choose Publish, you get more options including having Canva print and ship the finished design to your door.
I have not tried it, but the pricing is fairly reasonable. And it’s free shipping. Love THAT!
I hope you found this tutorial helpful. I plan to do more in the following weeks. Next, we will turn the giraffe printable into a party invitation.
Pin this tutorial for future reference.
Let me know if you would to create more fun designs with me in Canva by commenting below!
Planning a party can take a lot of money and time. But most of the time it doesn’t have to cost as much as we think. The solution is use what you have or buy something really cheap and create something magnificent with it to decorate your party.
Today I’m going to give you 5 ideas on on how to decorate a party and wow your guests.
I hope you didn’t throw those tissue papers from your holiday celebrations away because you just wasted tons of good tissue papers and money for your next party.
By the way, I’m not talking about the tissue paper you blow your nose with. I’m talking about the tissue paper that you stuff into gift bags to hide the fact that you don’t have time to wrap the gifts!!! You know who you are!
Here are five ways to decorate your party with tissue papers!
1. TASSELS
Tassels will always be in style. They are super easy to make. Here are some awesome tutorials on how to turn tissue papers into tassels. Visit Purely Katie to learn how to make these tassels. Attached to a balloon and you got an awesome table centerpiece or a photo prop for a 1st birthday or gender reveal photo shoot. An awesome idea is to put something in the balloon to reveal the gender of the baby when popped.
Here is another way to use tassels. Make a tissue paper garland and hang them all over your house. If you’re doing a 1st birthday party, you can add pictures of the baby between the tassels with cute clothespins.
Make tons of tissue paper pom poms and flowers. Another really simple DIY. You can make them really big or really tiny for a doll’s party. Jennifer from the Crafted Patch Blog will show you how to make these in different sizes. These are actually fun to make with your friends over a little drink,like, tea. *wink*
This gorgeous flower backdrop which is perfect for a spring baby shower, bridal shower, 1st birthday party, or any kind of party, is made from lots of tissue paper. You can learn to make them here.
Make these cute little flowers to use as a place setting. Attached a floral wire and put them into a little vase to make a table centerpiece. Or can also make party favors by attaching a clip and attaching a thank you note to it. Learn how to make them here.
You can simply layer different color tissue papers and hang them on a baker’s twine, yarn, or whatever string you have lying around to make a tissue paper garland. You can add a little more flare by snipping it however you want. Check out this multi colored tissue garland from Pizzazzerie. Make it shabby chic by folding these doilies over the tissue paper. Or put these over the tissue garland for Valentine’s Day.
How gorgeous are these guys?! You can mix so many different colors to match your party theme. Group these guys on a wall and you got an Instagram-worthy photo backdrop! Check out the tutorial on A subtle Revelry!
This is a bonus cause if you want to make it this long it might take a while, but look how awesome the end result is. It would be so fun to make and see the guests face when they enter your house. Just make this over a movie marathon with the kids snipping lots of tissue paper. OH SO FUN, right??!!! Learn to make it from Oh Happy Day.
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