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Independent craft blog since 2007

Shapely App: A new way to create great designs

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Shapely App

Designer Chris Jones has designed a lot of invitations and t-shirts for his friends. Eventually he began to wonder if there was a simple tool non-designers could use to create well-made custom images. He scoured the web and App Store and found nothing. So he rolled up his sleeves and created Shapely.

Shapely is a free app made to indulge your creative side. Jones has worked for the past year to design and release Shapely, and he hopes that it will help people who are not trained in design have fun making custom images and photos.

Shapely offers users a variety of shapes, patterns, icons and text options to create custom images which can be used on phones and websites, or printed for use on cards, photo album covers and fliers. Users choose from 96 shapes including badges and cartouches, and select from backgrounds including plaids, stripes, chevrons and woodgrains. Shapely users can utilize these features, along with their own photos, to create Shapely images.

Beta testers include local designers and photographers, as well as individuals from non-creative fields such as healthcare, education, insurance and real estate. During the beta period they created images ranging from holiday greeting card images and portrait and landscape photos put into shapes, to a wedding save the date and quirky graphics with captions such as “Happiness is a warm cup of joe” and “What good shall I do this day?”

You can download the ShapelyApp for free, with an optional $1.99 in-app upgrade to Shapely Pro for a wider variety of features. More information can be found at www.shapelyapp.com.

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Celebrating Mexican Independence Day

Lots of Americans seem to think that May 5 is Mexican Independence Day, but that holiday actually falls on Sept. 16.

May 5 is the celebration of the Battle of Puebla, in which the Mexicans defeated the French in 1862. Independence Day marks the beginning of their fight for independence from Spain in 1810. That was the day of what’s known as El Grito de Dolores, or the cry of Dolores, for when the Catholic priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla rang the church bells at his church in Dolores and declared that Mexico should be free from Spanish rule. 

They would fight for their freedom until 1821 when they finally gained independence. 

Fabulous Classroom has a little of the history and ideas for celebrating the holiday for all age groups. There’s also a link to a good video in that post about the real story of Mexican Independence Day. 

Twinkl also has a good tops about the history and different activities, discussion ideas, crafts and foods that can be incorporated into lessons at school or used at home. 

I also found a few pins that no longer link to a website but include good information on Mexican Independence Day, including some questions for students to answer based on the reading. You can find more printables and questions for kids from TX Homeschool Mama on Etsy (also available in Spanish). 

You can find a lot more paid resources about Mexican Independence Day at Teachers Pay Teachers. 

Mexican flag crafts are a fun option for celebrating Mexican Independence Day (though the current iteration of their flag has only been in use since 1968). Kids Activities Blog has a free Mexican flag printable and a few different ideas for decorating it including dot markers and torn tissue paper. 

You can also find some great Mexican crafts at Red Ted Art. The post includes all sorts of Mexican inspired projects including Day of the Dead crafts, Frida Kahlo pinatas and upcycled musical instruments. I love the giant paper flowers they shared from Honestly WTF.