Hello there friends! It’s Aly here today sharing a quick and easy gift idea for your child’s new teacher this year. Since my daughter spends so much time at school, and her teacher works so hard, I like to let her teacher know how much I appreciate everything she does at the start of the school year. Check out how I made these DIY Perforated Notepads with my new Dial Trimmer.
To create these teacher notepads, I had to cut several sheets of paper to size, score the covers, and perforate the pages inside. I was able to do all of this with just one tool. So easy!
The Staple Board made it easy to bind the notepad pages together with the covers. I love the copper staples–so chunky and pretty!
To make these back-to-school teacher gifts, I started by trimming the covers to 3×12 inch strips using my Dial Trimmer. That will make (3×6 inch notepads.) All I had to do was align my paper in the guide, turn the dial to the straight blade, then pull it down.
Then I rotated the dial to the scoring blade, and scored the covers at 6 inches and 6 7/8 inches.
I folded the 6 inch score line so that my cover pattern was on the outside, then I folded the 6 7/8 inch score line the opposite direction. This is what the cover should look like after scoring and folding:
Next I trimmed some lined paper to 3×5 7/8 inches (to make sure the bottom edges of the lined paper don’t peek out passed the edges of the cover). I perforated the top of each one at 7/8 inch–it was easy to turn the dial and do with the same tool! Yes!
After perforating the lines pages, I assembled the notepads.
I used the Staple Board to bind the covers and pages. I recommend using thin text weight paper inside. Depending on the thickness of your paper, you can staple between 7-10 pages inside your cardstock cover with the large staples. Test out how many you can do with scraps of the paper you will be using.
Use the guides on the board to align your staple perfectly, and then press down on a hard stable surface using your bodyweight to help.
Once I stapled the notepads, I added a few embellishments from the Maggie Holmes Chasing Dreams collection to the front to match the covers from the same collection. I chose sentiments that I hope will inspire the teacher.
I love that you can pull each page out if needed. I love the perforating feature of the Dial Trimmer–so many possibilities!
This project is a great teacher gift, but would also be perfect for your student, friends, neighbors, or coworkers. Everyone can always use another notebook. Especially when it’s handmade with love.
This project took minutes with my new Dial Trimmer, and I hope my daughter’s second grade teacher enjoys them and will put them to good use. Thanks for joining me, and happy back-to-school crafting friends!
Supplies:
Dial Trimmer
Staple Board
Maggie Holmes Chasing Dreams Collection
