Thursday Raves 5/23/13

Welcome to the very first Thursday Raves with Polka Dot Palace!!!

Thursday Raves is quite simple. Write a post about something that you think is just awesome, amazing, marvelous, & stupendous; so glad you found it or someone told you about it. It may be a person, place, thing, website, app...it's really up to you. It doesn't necessarily have to be something that you have to have, (it's ok if is though) but it's something that you just thought was awesome & you need to "rave" about it to someone. Post it to your blog with the above picture in the post linked back to my weekly linky & voila!

Here's my first rave!!!

Scotch's Thermal Laminator
(I am in no way representing Scotch, I am simply expressing my opinion from personal experience)

This is the one that I have, but from looking at Wal-Mart's website it looks like they are carrying a newer one now.

This is what the newer one looks like, from Wal-Mart's website, but it seems like they use the same pouches.

 A few years ago a friend of mine was telling me about hers and how much she loved it and it was really useful for small items. One night the mister and I were at Wal-Mart and they were relatively inexpensive there, like $25-$30, so I snagged one and my life changed forever.

It's great because there's no film to change, you put what you want laminated into one of these pouches and send the pouch through the laminator. Scotch makes a few different sized pouches; I've used the 8.5x11 & the 9x12 and put multiple small items in it, like calendar pieces.

I really like to use mine for things that my kiddos are going to use a lot. The lamination from the pouches is thicker than your typical school laminator, so cardstock + Scotch laminating = very sturdy.
I tend to laminate playing cards, flash cards, etc. that the kids will be touching and playing with a lot to try and give them some longevity.

I also like to use it for my smaller pieces because it is easier to lay small pieces in the pouch, then to try & line them up with a big, school laminator. For instance, I have a calendar pocket chart and laminated all of the date pieces with my Scotch laminator instead of trying to beat the rollers on a big laminator.

If you don't already have a laminator like this I would highly recommend one. I don't think you would regret this purchase, especially if you're like me....I laminate everything!!!