Make Your Own Marbleized Paper

This hand made marbleized paper is great to use with other paper craft projects such as scrapbooking pages or can be used to make paper beads (those directions can be found in my other article, Paper Beads a How-To Guide). This is a somewhat messy project so kids tend to enjoy it but adults that are just kids at heart find it fun as well.

You will need the following materials:

Disposable baking pans

Shaving cream

Pieces of cardboard

Food coloring

Plastic forks

White printer paper

As stated above, this project can get messy so make sure you cover your work surface with newspaper and you may want to have a plastic bag handy to lay used cardboard on.

First you will need to fill the disposable baking pans with shaving cream, I find it easiest to use pans that are 9"x13" but as long as your paper will fit inside, it doesn't really matter what size you use. Make sure you use plain old shaving cream, you don't want to use a gel because you really need the foam to make this project work. Use a piece of cardboard to smooth out the shaving cream so it is as level as possible.

Next put drops of food coloring around the shaving cream, using as many colors as you want. Then use the plastic fork to swirl the colors around to create a marbleized look, don't mix the colors too much or else you won't see the swirling effect.

Now set your white piece of paper on top of the shaving cream and press down slightly. Peel the paper off and place it on the newspaper that you have set out. Use a piece of cardboard to scrape off the shaving cream that has been left behind on the paper.

Leave your marbleized paper on the newspaper until it is fully dry and then use it however you want. If you use a lot of color the paper will be great for a background page of a scrapbook or you can do numerous paper crafts with it. You can also make some very nice stationary if you don't cover the whole paper with colors and then use it to write a nice letter or make a stack of these pages and give them away as a neat homemade gift. Don't worry if the first few pages come out messy looking, the more you make the more you'll understand how the coloring will end up looking in the end.