Valentine’s Day Blog Hop

Happy Saturday morning and welcome to our 2014 Valentine’s Day Blog Hop! You should have reached here from D’s blog at Designs By Dragonfly.  If you are just joining me here, please go to  RockinRenee's blog to start at the beginning so you won’t miss any of the fun.  There are so many great projects and I don't want you to miss a single one!  Today we are highlighting Valentine's Day inspired projects.  I made a “Card in a Box” for Valentine’s Day. I first saw these on Split Coast Stampers site and I couldn’t wait to try it myself.

These are so much fun to make and very easy also. You can change it up to make one for any occasion. A tutorial for making these can be found at Tina Wetter’s blog, SereneStamper.com (since I followed her tutorial, I want to give her credit for this!). It only takes one sheet of cardstock to make the foundation of the ‘box’ and then you can decorate it however you’d like. There are two small pieces of cardstock inside of the box that you use to layer your embellishments.

I used several different images from different cartridges to create my embellishments.

The Cupid is from Artiste, the hearts are from Art Philosophy and Lyrical Letters, the rolled flowers are also from Art Philosophy, and the ‘Happy Valentine’s Day’ sentiment (below on the envelope) is cut from Artiste.

In the photo above, I stamped some Tim Holtz stamps on vellum using VersaMark ink and white embossing powder then punched a couple of  butterflies with a Stampin’ Up punch. Then I dressed them up with some pearls. The Valentine tickets are also stamps by Tim Holtz. I used patterned paper by Echo Park.

 

The back panel of the box is left upright so that you can add another cardstock layer to put your greeting and sentiment on. I haven’t put that part on yet since I made this Valentine for my grandson to give to his babysitter and I want him to ‘write’ his name (I guess scribble something would be more accurate since he just turned one, lol)  or put his handprint on it. Whatever he does, I figured it would be better to adhere that part on AFTER he finishes with it!

I used my handy dandy Envelope Punch Board (I LOVE this!) to make an envelope that not only matches my card but it is also the perfect size! Here is the Valentine sentiment that I cut from the Artiste cart. It cut out beautifully at only 2.50”!

All you need to do is fold your box flat to put it in your envelope! I think this is such a neat idea and something different. I loved this card in a box idea so much that I couldn’t stop making them…

as you can see! I haven’t put the embellishments on these yet so maybe you can see the pieces of cardstock inside that you use to adhere your embellishments to. (Sorry I didn’t get a better photo of that).

Well, I hoped that you enjoyed my Valentine’s Day project and are inspired to try a Card in a Box yourself! If you have any questions please leave me a comment below (I love to receive some “blog love”!). I can’t wait for my little Charlie to give this to his babysitter!'

Sorry, I just couldn’t help myself! LOL!

Thank you for joining me today.  Your next stop on the hop is with *Violette* at Whimsical-Treasures.
And here is the entire blog list just in case you get lost on your way:
1. RockinRenee - I came, I saw, I created.
2. HappyScrapper64 - Random Thoughts of a Scrapbooker
3. gonescrappin - Col's Creative Corner
4. Hrvatica  - Croatian Crafter
5. Scootingranny - Scootingranny's World
6. MamaC - Carolyn's Creative Corner
7. Greenie8705 - Gina Beana's Crafts
8. MariaJ - Stamp, Cut, Create!
9. Di&Co - Creating Is Like Breathing
10. Dragonfly50 - Designs by Dragonfly
11. TiffysMom - Angie's Paper Passion <<---YOU ARE HERE! 12. *Violette* - Whimsical Treasures <<---GO HERE NEXT!
13. cricutaddicted - ScrappingForMoreFun
14. LoriSjogren - The Singing Shell
15. scrapalette - Around the Block with Scrapalette

I am so happy to be crafting again! Thanks for sticking with me!

Until next time, Happy Crafting,

50’s Inspired Note Card Set ~ Card #2

Thanks for checking back in to see the next card in the 50’s Inspired Note Card Set! The next card is created from the percolator image in the Suburbia cart. Now if you don’t know what a percolator is – please go Google it because you are still very young, lol!

I used patterned papers from the same paper stack made by Prima – love everything Prima! It’s a  6x6 stack called Almanac. I created it the same way that I created the old telephone card from yesterday – by welding two of the pots shadow images together in Cricut Craft Room to make the card base.

For the embellishments, I added Glossy Accents to the handle, the spout, and the lid’s handle to give them some texture and shine. (hard to see that clearly in the photo below, sorry!)

I also added ink for shading and another one of my flowers that I made with Artiste and some more of that seam binding that I hand dyed with Tim Holtz Distress Stains. And to give it that 50’s glam, I added some black gemstones.

Thanks for visiting! Don’t forget that there are two more cards to this set that I’ll be showing you on Wednesday and Thursday so I’ll see you tomorrow!

Until then, Happy Crafting!

50’s Inspired Set of Shaped Note Cards ~ FCCB Challenge #171

Good morning everyone!  It’s Challenge Me Monday at Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog and the theme this week is Shaped Cards! So after seeing my project, please go to FCCB and check out what the other Design Team members have created and then join in on the fun and make a shaped card yourself – any card as long as you have one Cricut cut on it – and upload it for a chance to win a prize from one of our sponsors!

For this week, I created a set of note cards that were inspired from the 1950’s and of course they were all made with the Suburbia cartridge!

The first card is the old telephone! I love all of these old images on this cart. I took two images from page 41, using the Shadow/Icon Shadow feature which is the phone’s shadow and flipped on of them upside down in the Cricut Craft Room. I made sure that they were even and then got the tops close enough together so that they could be welded. Then I cut out the two Icon shapes of the phone using two different patterned papers from Prima.

When I think of the 50’s I sometimes think of the “idealized version” (I know that my family didn’t live in that version but I often look at things with my rose-colored glasses on, lol, KWIM?) So I immediately thought of shows like Mad Men and I Love Lucy (I know, two VERY different shows lol) and of the stay-at-home wives doing their housework with their high heels on wearing a string of pearls! OK, back to reality! But I wanted my cards to have that same feeling so I added large and medium sized pearls to the dial, a flower cut from Artiste with Tim Holtz cardstock, and seam binding that I hand dyed myself with distressed stains from Tim Holtz.

I decided to add another layer to the inside so I could created my sentiment on lighter cardstock so I used the Icon feature again (no shift) and used the Hide Contour feature to hide the dial and cut it out using the TH cardstock.

Everyday this week I’ll show you another note card from this set so please come back tomorrow to see the 2nd card! Thank you so much for craving a little time out of your busy life to come visit me ~ I really appreciate it!

Now I hope that we have inspired you to create your own shaped card and upload it at FCCB! I know that my Design Team sisters have created some more great projects to inspire you as well!

Until next time, Happy Crafting!

Christmas in July Blog Hop ~ Christmas Ornaments!

Welcome to the third part of the Christmas in July Blog Hop! This weeks theme is Christmas Ornaments and there is a great line up of Cricut crafting bloggers to visit to see their projects. If you are stopping here from Paulette’s blog, Around the Block with Scrapalette, then you are in the right place. If not, then just hop on over to her blog to start at the beginning and see her fantastic project! She has blog candy for this weeks hop – a Trim the Tree Cricut cartridge! So be sure to leave a comment on each of the blogs to have more chances to win!

For my project today, I created not one but two different ornaments using the same Cricut cartridge – Artiste!

The first one is originally a three-sided 3-D box shape. I welded 3 triangle shapes from George & Basic Shapes to it to form openings on each side:

Before putting it together, I added rhinestones, ribbon, and beads to it. Then after adhering the box together, I added a Christmas pick to the inside.

The second ornament is also from the Artiste cartridge (and actually from the very same page in the handbook). I cut out 6 of the same ornament shapes, scored them and adhered them together to form a 3-D shaped ornament. I found this next tip the hard way – since this shape is not symmetrical, make sure that 3 of the shapes are flipped before you cut them out, lol!!! Here’s what it should look like on the mat in CCR:

Notice the red shapes are flipped! Again, before adhering the shapes together, I added strings of beads that I put together at the top, bottom, and on each side of the ornament. Here are some photos of the steps to create this ornament:

And there are my two Christmas ornaments for today! Hope you enjoyed them!

I also will have a drawing for blog candy today! To be entered, just leave a comment below and become a follower of my blog!

I hope you enjoyed your visit today! Next up on the blog hop is the fabulous Colleen at Col’s Creative Corner.

If you get lost while hopping today, here is the line up:

Paulette at http://scrapalette.blogspot.com/
Angela at http://angiespaperpassion.blogspot.com/ <--- You Are Here!
Colleen at http://scrappycol.blogspot.com/ <--- Next
Theresa at http://scrapsbygracie.blogspot.com/
Beth at http://seaswancreations.blogspot.com/
Laura at http://www.coolbeansbylb.blogspot.com/
Lori at http://singingshell.blogspot.com/

I will be back on 27 July with another Cricut Christmas project for our next Christmas in July Hop so be sure to come back to visit! So until then – happy hopping and…

Merry Christmas in July!!!

Another 3-D Lantern

Hello everyone! Sorry I haven’t blogged in a while but today is my day to post over at Cricut FANantics blog and I have decided to show you another 3-D lantern I made from Cricut Exclusives, 3-D Lanterns. I absolutely love making these and they'd also be great for decorating for parties! Can you imagine a bunch of these made in red, white, and blue hanging from the trees in your backyard for next months 4th of July party! That would make a WOW factor for your guests!

After I made the last lantern (which you can see HERE in another post), my little granddaughter wanted one for her room in her favorite color - purple.

Here's what I made for her:

I added a handle made of cardstock and strips of vellum. And of course she had to have bling on it!

I decided to try cutting out the rolled flowers out of vellum instead of cardstock and I really like how they turned out! These flowers were cut out with the Artiste cart at 2.5" and 2". Just remember to change your settings (pressure, blade depth, & speed) on your machine when cutting something as thin as vellum.

She turns on the little light under her lantern every night before going to sleep and thinks about her Grandma! (OK, I just added that last part myself but I'm pretty sure she really does thinks about me every night!)

Thanks for coming by today and please visit again soon! Until next time, Happy Crafting!

Mother’s Day Card –Fantabulous Cricut Challenge #159

Hey there my crafty friends! I hope everyone had a great weekend. There was so much going on these past couple of days – Saturday was National Scrapbooking Day and yesterday was Cinco de Mayo! And today is the Mother’s Day card challenge on Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog. Come on over and join in on this weeks challenge and not only will you be inspired by my fellow Design Team sisters, but you’ll have a special card that you created yourself for Mother’s Day next Sunday. Now here’s my Mother’s Day card -

I wanted to try some different card-making techniques that I came across on Split Coast Stampers. They have wonderful tutorials for so many different kinds of projects. So I combined this Lever Card with some Cricut images to create my card. The photo above is what the card looks like when it’s closed. Now this is what it looks like when opened -

Cool, huh?

For the front of my card I cut out the birdcage from the Bloom Lite cart at 3” and used pop dots to adhere it to the front ‘lever’ panel. I had forgotten how much I liked this cart – there are some very cute images on it! (The digital version is on sale now at Cricut.com.) I stamped a sentiment onto cardstock and punched it out and adhered it to the bottom front of the card with pop dots.

For the center panel, I cut out another birdcage from Bloom also at 3”. For this birdcage I decided that I wanted it to ‘hang’ from a tree branch that I cut from Serenade at 1.4”.  The branch is adhered so that it stretches across both panels. I then threaded some twine through the top of the cage and tied it around the end of the branch.

The butterfly was a part of the second birdcage image and it has three layers, two of which are popped up with pop dots.

I wanted to add a Mother's Day sentiment to the last panel but most phrases were a little too big for this spot. I needed something no wider than about 1.5”. Here is just one of the reasons why I love my Cricut so much (ok, I know that should be plural as in CRICUTS!, LOL). You have the ability to manipulate the images to your liking! For instance, the “I love you” sentiment from the Artiste cart is actually one long phrase that measures 2.7” wide. I really couldn’t make it any narrower because it would’ve been too small to read or even to cut out nicely. At 2.7” wide, it was only 1.11” tall! So I left it as it was, and after it was cut, I hand cut the word “love” from the rest of the sentiment and rearranged it into a vertical sentiment!

Here’s a screen shot of what the phrase originally looked like in the Craft Room:

I think it looks pretty good in it’s new arrangement! So there’s another challenge for you – if an image doesn’t work for you, change it!

So there’s my Mother’s Day card! (Sorry the colors in my photos are the way they are. This paper is so much prettier IRL! It was just hard trying to get it to look that way here!)

Now head over to FCCB, get inspired by the other Design Team member projects, and then join in on this weeks challenge!

If you’d like to learn how to make your own Lever Card, go to the tutorial here on Split Coast Stampers.

Don’t forget to check back tomorrow on Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog. I write a post there every Tuesday with Quick Tips! I’d love to hear some of your comments about my tips!

Supplies used:

• Cricut Expression and Cricut Craft Room
• CTMH Artist, Bloom, and Serenade Cricut cartridges
• Sentiment stamp, label punch, patterned paper – Stampin’ Up
• Twine – Pink Paislee
• Ink – Tim Holtz Distress ink pad
• cardstock, adhesive, pop dots

Until next time, Happy Crafting!

Mother’s Day Card

Hey friends! I hope that everyone is either keeping cool or warm, depending on where you are. Or, if you’re like us in North Texas, you’re keeping warm AND cool!!! In the last week, I’ve gone from the 80’s to the high 30’s and back again! But moving on, I know that Mother’s Day is a month away but because I have a bad habit of procrastinating AND I have been taking care of my 2 month old Grandson, I hardly have time to do much crafting lately. So when I started thinking of Mother’s Day cards, I knew that I need something that was simple but still beautiful and special (my Mom just turned 93!!!). So for these reasons, if I'm going to send any cards out this year, I need to start NOW and make it simple on myself.

So I went to Cricut.com to see what my "simple" options were. I had been looking at the Craft Room Exclusives like the sets of single Mother's Day cards and I found one that I really liked:

So I bought it - cut two pieces - glue!!! Easy peasy! Plus it was 1.99 and now with the sale going on it is 1.69 (If you're a Cricut Circle member, you get an addition 10% off). No need to wait for it to be mailed to you - it will be in your Cricut Craft Room the next time you open it! Again, really simple!

I used paper from K&Company for the card and cut it a 5.5".

I just wanted to show you up close how detailed those cuts are.

All the cuts were nice and smooth for being so detailed.

But I still needed something extra on that card. I thought about it for a long time and finally can up with this (you know how I love my flowers and my bling! LOL!)

And there they are! The flowers were cut on the Cricut with the CTMH Artiste cart at 3.25' and 4'. I used some seam binding that I had hand-dyed myself with Distress Ink in Peeled Paint. Then I added some branches from a Martha Stewart hand punch and the bling is from Colorbok.

A Close Up of my rolled flowers, ribbon, and punched leaves.

Okay, so even though I did add a few things, I think it a perfect card for a special Mom! And they won't take long to make. In the Cricut Craft Room make the card base as many times as you need. The next time that you have a few minutes, cut out the flowers with the Cricut and punch some leaves with a punch (or even make those with the Cricut, too). The roses can be rolled one evening while watching T.V. I use Scotch Quick Drying Adhesive or Glossy Accents and they both work great and they DO DRY FAST! Then all you would need to do is put them all together - assembly line style! In no time at all you will have a stack of cards just waiting to be mailed.

I just wanted to share with you that you can take a simple card from CCR and make it extraordinary all for only a couple of bucks. But they won't look like it!

Thanks for dropping by and until next time, Happy Crafting,

St. Patty’s Day Candy Cracker

Hey guys! Do you know that St. Patrick’s Day is next Sunday? Well, I’m sure you all know that I’m not Irish, lol, but like my friend Danita said, “you can kiss me anyway”! Today is my guest designer day over at Cricut FANatics and I made this candy cracker for St. Patty’s Day.

It was so easy to cut out and put together. I used the CTMH Artist cartridge for the cracker cutting it out at 9.25”. There is also a cracker image on Tags, Bags, Boxes & More 2. The sentiment was cut from Tags, Bags, Boxes & More 2 at 2”. I would’ve loved using glitter cardstock for the “Good Luck” but I didn’t have the right colors so I used regular cardstock and used Stickles in Platinum and Lagoon to color the images. Before I cut out the cracker, I created a rectangle from CCR Basics and welded it to the cracker in the Cricut Craft Room to create a window in the cracker. After it was cut, I used Scor-Tape (Love this stuff!!!) to adhere a piece of transparency to the inside.

Instead of using ribbon as a closure, I wrapped some gold tinsel that I bought at Michaels last Christmas at each end. (Who knew you could use up your Christmas hoard for other holidays! Yet again, hoarding pays off, lol) It’s filled with lucky gold chocolate coins! Oh yes, it just couldn’t be finished without some green bling!

Now it’s all ready to ‘POP’!

I hope that you all have a wonderful St. Patty’s Day next weekend. Now I need to get to work on some Easter projects! See you soon and until next time, Happy Crafting!