If there's one thing I'm great at, it's wasting time. I'm the kind of girl that can sit staring at the television set for hours on end without it actually being on. I can convincingly sustain a serious conversation without taking in a single word said, and I can sit staring at the stars aimlessly- calling it entertainment. It's actually quite profound.Recently, however, I've been taking advice from my bestie Ron Weasley who infamously stated 'she needs to sort out her priorities'. Truer words may have never been spoken.So I have- to some extent anyway. It's called procrastination with a purpose. It originated from a pact I made a while ago with a few friends of mine; we unanimously agreed not to do birthday, Christmas and Eid gifts or the likes. This wasn't because we found it difficult to remember dates (or rely on the inconsistencies of a new lunar cycle), it was because our punctuality meant that a present that was meant to be delivered in April, never actually got to the recipient until January the following year. As such, we now give gifts spontaneously. I prefer it this way. It's a nice little surprise most of the time.On a somewhat similar note, someone also once said that 'attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity'. There's beauty in that and it's something I try to live by.So here's my tutorial for a gift I made today and if you scroll to the bottom, there are some pretty nifty variations of it (if I do say so myself).It was originally inspired by this piece at Etsy:Don't get me wrong, this is a beautiful wedding gift- with personalised song lyrics and initials to match! It's so thoughtful, so elegant and SO expensive (at least for me). With a value of over £50, my friends weren't worth that price tag- no offence. So I made my own:I did butcher my spare copy of Harry Potter for this. This was for my auntie (who loved the Chaos Walking trilogy so much she skipped right to the final chapter to find out the ending). What you'll need:

A4 frame (Poundshop)
A4 parchment paper (Amazon)
A book/ quotes/ printouts of your choice (to shape into hearts)
Pritt Stick
Pencil
Scissors
Black craft paper (Wilkinsons)
Alphabet Stamp Set and Ink Pad (Amazon)

Step 1:Take out the glass layer of your frame and replace it with the parchment paper. Then place the glass layer behind the paper. Then fit the back of the frame as normal.I've already done this in the picture above.Step 2:Cut out a template heart. Your frame should come with some thick paper- just use that. Play about with the size and shape of the heart itself until you're happy with it.Step 3:Make another heart- ensure it's a little bigger than the original. This will become the template for the black craft paper.Step 4:Draw round the little heart on your chosen pages/ printouts and then cut out 15 separate hearts. It's best to cut the paper into manageable pieces and draw on the back to avoid visible pencil lines. Step 5:Repeat the process with the bigger heart template against the black craft paper. You want to make sure the template sizes up nicely with the little hearts.I think the black works nicely with the border of the frame,
but obviously the colour choice is up to you.Step 6:Glue the little hearts and big hearts together and fold them again vertically for a nice 3D effect.Step 7:Place the hearts onto the frame and fiddle about with where you want to put them before actually gluing them down. When gluing them onto the parchment paper, only stick down one side of the heart. Alternate which sides you stick down.On this occasion, I've decided to place the 3 darkest hearts
diagonally.Step 8:Use your stamps to print out your chosen name, dates, quotes etc. Use a ruler to line up your words into some vague straight line- remember to rub this out gently at the end.Alternatively, to save buying the stamp set, you can use www.dafont.com to find a font of your choice and print it straight onto the parchment paper itself. I probably should've mentioned this in step one- never mind.And there you have it- the perfect graduation, birthday, anniversary etc. gift! It costs about £5 to make and you get brownie points for it being handmade.I've made variations of these frames inspired by Harry Potter, Game of Thrones and various other interests. I've pasted a couple of picture below and the rest can be found on my Pinterest- enjoy and happy crafting!

BROWN GIRL SCRIBBLING

BURHANA ISLAM

89 Days of Summer