by Richelle Naegle

One of my favorite products to use is the MINC foil machine. I think this machine helps to add a lot of variety and creativity to my craft projects. I don’t always remember to get it out and use it, so I’ve made an extra effort lately to use it to its fullest. Heidi Swapp has come out with some great new products that make adding foil to anything quick and easy, without the use of a laser printer.

Reactive Paint & Toner Pens

The first of these products is MINC Reactive paint. It works great for quickly adding foil to any place on your paper. I took a regular sheet (pictured to the right) of 6 x 6 paper and a small paintbrush along with the reactive paint. Just squeeze a small amount onto a little piece of wax paper and simply paint where ever you want the foil to be. Then let the paint completely dry (in this case it took about 10 minutes). Pro tip: you can use your blow dryer to speed up the drying process.

Once it is completely dry, cover it with foil and run it through your machine. I would suggest using a different MINC transfer folder for this. If not, this project can compromise the next by leaving excess paint and foil on your machine. You can see with the picture to the left how some of the dots have foil on them. I love this helpful product. It will make it so much easier to add that little pop of foil to your next project.

Heidi Swapp also has the MINC toner pen, which is perfect for adding foil to something that you have handwritten, or for touching up a spot that your laser printer missed. We also have MINC reactive mist and you can see Heidi Swapp’s video here on the reactive mist. Watch the pro as she uses it so you can get creative and make beautiful projects with your MINC foil applicator.

Also, you can foil your vinyl to create fun vinyl projects with more brilliance using your MINC foil applicator. If you missed the post on how easy this is to do, you can read it: How to Foil Your Vinyl Material!

Foil Pinwheels

I have a party coming up and I thought adding foil to these fun pinwheels would be a great idea. They have toner on both sides, which allowed me to add different colors and patterns. My absolute favorite to make was the one using the houndstooth design with pink and gold ombre reactive foil. I have a close up of it to the right. I put blue on the back and the ombre design on the front. It gave it such a unique look!

You can also see I used some white reactive foil on these, which is always a very popular color. The white doesn’t have the same shimmer and shines that the rest of the foil colors do, but it does have a very beautiful finish.

Halloween Foil Banner

Next, I created a fun Halloween banner using the MINC and the Pebbles Boo Banner, the Jumbo Striped Alphabet orange foil and a pack of the toner sheets.

First, I cut out the fun little pumpkin from the Holiday Cakes Cricut cartridge at 3″ I cut the top layer using the toner sheets and then ran everything through the MINC machine with the MINC orange foil. I used my Crop-A-Dile tool to punch holes in the corners so that I could string up my banner. Don’t you just love how this banner turned out? I can’t wait ’til October so I can put it back on the front door!

Christmas Projects

Next, I wanted to create something for (Heidi Swapp) Christmas and I absolutely love, love, love the MINC 3D Paper Village. For this project, I only used the gold foil and the kit. It was easy and no extra supplies were needed. I grouped my material and everything together, which made it easier to find everything I needed for each house during the project.

These houses come with the 3D adhesive already adhered to them so it makes it super easy to just peel and stick them together. I found that the adhesive sticks really well and so you want to make sure you take your time and align them up before you stick them down. Once they are down they are down. Then add your stickers and you are done.

Note: this kit also comes with fun stickers like ribbons and wreaths that you could use to decorate your houses. So if you are going to use them make sure you have some green and red foil, and the best way to do that is to pick up our Christmas MINC foil bundle. This kit will also give you silver as well.

Save on Heidi Swapp Minc at CraftDirect

I hope you have enjoyed all these fun MINC projects. If I have inspired you to create something new with your MINC machine share them with me on our Instagram page and tag us with #craftdirect so we can see what you are creating!

Happy creating!