SHRINKY DINKS -SWAPS
The Girl Scouts of Central and Southern New Jersey delegation to the 2011 National GSUSA conference is doing a coordinated swap within our delegation, and we would like to encourage other attendees to participate in this coordinated swap.
PROPOSED SWAP – Charms for charm bracelets – made from shrinky dinks (or other materials). This is a terrific swap because:
1)It is relatively inexpensive – you can make about 20 swaps from one sheet of shrinky dink paper
2)There are ways to produce them in quantity (rubber stamping or using a printer/copy machine)
3)It allows for a high degree of customization – you can either use graphic images from the internet or you can draw your own.
4)It is small/lightweight so you can bring a lot of them to the convention without needing an extra piece of luggage
5)It allows you to be creative – each person can make their own design or several different ones!
6)By attaching a safety pin, this can also be given as a pin swap.
7)Even mediocre artwork looks better when made and shrunk on shrinky dink paper. Shrinky Dinks (shrinkydinks.com) are a shrinkable plastic in a sheet,that shrinks to 1/3 its original size and becomes thicker when heated. .
One of our service units has done this for their Thinking Day event, in which each troop has a country and made charms representing that country. A photo of a charm bracelet with shrinky dink country charms is attached.
BASIC CONCEPT: Each person that wishes to participate would make charms for a charm bracelet as their swap. These could be made out of any material. Shrinky dink charms are suggested, but not required. Each charm should have a silver toned snap ring (approximately 7 or 8 mm size), to be used to attach the charm to a charm bracelet. The charms would be representative of that person, her troop, service unit, Council, or area. Each person could use one design or multiple designs.
Each person that is participating would bring their own charm bracelet (or a necklace) to put the charms they receive on. You might want to bring some safety pins if you swap with people that are not swapping charms. If a lot of members of your delegation are participating in this, you might want to encourage other members who are not swapping charms to bring a charm bracelet for the charms they will receive – at least from your delegation.
COST: Basic charm bracelets cost $1-5 depending on quality. You just need a bracelet with metal links large enough to attach charms to. Craft stores sometimes carry them. Dollar Stores also sometimes have them. The cost really depends on how you make the charms, and how many charms you make. If you used frosted ruff N ready shrinky dink paper, you could make about 150-200 charms for around $10
SHRINKY DINK PAPER: There are three types of Shrinky Dink paper that you could use:
- Frosted Ruff N/Ready, item D100-10A: sold in a pack of ten 8” x 10” sheets for $5.50. Available on-line and from Michaels. You can make 10-20 charms on a sheet of paper. I recommend that you use “frosted ruff n/ready” unless you’re planning to use an ink jet printer. Frosted ruff n/ready is designed to be colored with colored pencil. Also, it is translucent so that when you color one side the color shows through on the other side. You can order on-line in larger quantities (50 sheets for $22).
- Crystal clear, sold in a pack of ten 8” x 10” sheets for $5.18. You can use permanent markers, paint markers and staz-on ink pads.
- Shrinky Dink Paper for Ink Jet Printers: Sold in a pack of six 8” x 10” sheets for $9.36. This is their opaque white paper with a special coating. Since the paper is opaque, your charms will be one-sided if you use this. And, you need to apply a sealer.
From the Shrinky Dink website:
“Can I run Shrinky Dinks Plastic through my computer printer?
Yes, but you must use the Shrinky Dinks plastic designed for Ink Jet printers (Item D600-6A). The inks used in most printers are water based and meant for paper, but the coating that is applied to Shrinky Dinks Ink Jet plastic allows the water based inks to adhere. Without the special coating, it would be similar to painting water colors on a plastic bag, it would eventually dry, but it would never be permanent. We recommend using the Ink Jet Shrinky Dinks sheets in HP, Lexmark and Cannon printers. Epson have been tested and do not perform well with our Ink Jet plastic. Do not use Laser printers of any type when using our Shrinky Dinks sheets, the heat associated with Laser printers will produce poor results.
Can you use Shrinky Dinks in a copy machine?
Yes. If you have multiple images to make and don't want to trace or draw, you can run our Frosted Ruff N' Ready plastic through a standard copy machine. We recommend using a lower speed machine (10 to 12 copies per minute), and feeding the plastic one sheet at a time through the manual feed end of the machine. We DO NOT recommend using High Speed, Color or Laser copiers with our Shrinky Dinks...They get too hot and may melt the plastic inside of the machine.”
I have successfully used frosted ruff n/ready paper in my home laser printer/copier, (but try this at your own risk). My laser printer/copier has a special lower heat setting for printing transparencies.
PROCEDURE/APPROACHES using Shrinky Dink paper:
- Hand draw or use graphic images to create a master sheet which you then copy on a copier (lower speed machine) on frosted rough and ready shrinky dink paper. Either color copy, or hand color with colored pencils.
- Rubber stamp onto crystal clear shrinky dink paper, using staz-on ink pads. Optionally color with permanent markers or paint markers.
- Hand draw or use graphic images to create a master sheet which you then print/color copy with an inkjet printer onto special inkjet shrinky dink paper. Apply sealer as per directions.
For whichever approach you take, if you are making a master sheet, make sure your master drawings fit an 8” x 10” sheet, not 8½” x 11”. The charms should be approximately 3/4” – 7/8” or smaller when finished. This is 1 5/8” to 2” before shrinking. Make sure you leave a space to punch the hole. If you make a master drawing, you might want to draw a circle showing where the hole should be punched, and draw a dashed outline reminding you where to cut (avoid sharp corners – do rounded corners). If the hole punch is too far from the edge, it can be hard to get the jump/snap ring on. If it is too close to the edge, the hole may not be secure.
You might want to make a couple of charms with identifying info – your name/troop number/Council, 100th year of Girl Scouts, etc.
Make a couple of test charms before you start producing them in large quantity to make sure you are happy with size/color etc.
Make sure you punch the hole and cut out the charms BEFORE you shrink them. Cut rounded corners, no sharp corners.
Follow the directions on the shrinky dink package to shrink the charms. Basically, you pre-heat the oven to 325 degrees. Place theShrinky Dinks charms on a piece of brown grocery bag (not touching each other) colored side up on a cookie sheet. Bake approximately 1-3 minutes. Don’t panic when the charms start to curl up in the oven. That is normal. First they will curl up, then they will flatten back out again. After pieces lay flat, allow an additional 30 seconds of baking time to complete the baking process. Remove paper with ShrinkyDinks and lightly press flat with a pad of paper until pieces have cooled – approximately 15 seconds.
Put a jump/snap ring on each charm, which will be used to connect the charm to a charm bracelet. There are two types: 1) jump/snap rings, which are circles of metal with a break in the circle, and 2) split rings – which are like key chain rings. The split rings are more expensive, but are more secure. It is recommended that you buy them in 7mm or 8mm size. The smaller ones are much harder to handle.
You could add a paper tag with more information (your name/address/email). You could also swap these with a safety pin attached for people who would prefer to use it as a pin.
If you have any questions, feel free to call Louisa at 609-371-2119 or email her at