Falling for Halloween Blog Hop

There’s a chill in the air so that means Fall has arrived! Well, ok, it’s not that chilly here in Texas but I am still excited about the Fall season! So welcome to the Falling for Halloween Blog Hop where we will be enjoying all the wonderful crafty inspiration for the Fall and Halloween season.
You should have arrived here from Khrista’s blog. If not, you missed the beginning of the hop, so please go to Maria's blog to start so you don't miss any of the projects.
Here at My Paper Passion I will be giving away some Blog Candy to one lucky visitor! All you will need to do is visit here during the weekend Blog Hop and leave a comment on both days and become a follower. I will then enter your name into the drawing and pick a winner next week. 

So here is my first project (yes, there are two projects today! I made more than one and I just couldn’t decide which to post so you are getting to see both!)

I love Halloween! I love to decorate my home with little ghosts and witches. And I also love working and decorating with vinyl. So for this project I mixed these two loves together and came up with this:

I used a glass block that I purchased from Hobby Lobby and sprayed it with a Specialty Frosted Glass spray made by Rust-oleum.

To see my original post about how I used the frosted spray, please go HERE. Then I used the new Cricut cartridge A Frightful Affair. This is a fabulous cartridge! I cut out the image from page 45 using the Silhouette feature in black vinyl. Since this image is not square, I used the Cricut CraftRoom to size it to 7.25x7.25 using Real Dial size and cut out the vinyl using a “kiss cut” – that means that you are just cutting the vinyl and not the vinyl backing. My Cricut Expression was set at Pressure - medium and Blade - 2.

After cutting the vinyl and adhering it to the glass block, I inserted two strands of Halloween lights that I purchased at Michaels – one orange and one purple. This looks great with the room lights off.

So since I had my vinyl out I just had to make something else. So I cut out this for my living room wall:

For this project, I used two different Cricut cartridges – the new one by Teresa Collins, December 25th, and Songbird. The original image, from December 25th, for the decorative parts of this wall art has the word ‘December’ in the middle so I used the Hide Contour feature in Cricut CraftRoom to hide it. Then I used Songbird to spell out the word ‘Thankful’. Can you see how versatile these Cricut cartridges can be? You can take a Christmas cartridge and use it for any occasion! So go through your cartridges and see what you can come up with! 

Thanks so much for joining in on the hop today. Please be sure to check out all the participant's wonderful projects. I've posted the list below in case you've missed anyone. The next blog you will be visiting belongs to the very talented Nadia at http://www.withglitteringeyes.com/. Enjoy!

Maria @  stampcutcreate.blogspot.com

Michele @   scrap-n-dance.blogspot.com

Paulette @  http://scrapalette.blogspot.com/

Cindy @  http://www.inlovewithpaper.blogspot.com/

Beth @  http://seaswancreations.blogspot.com/

Renee @   icameisawicreated.blogspot.com

Debbie @ www.debseclecticthoughts.blogspot.com

Khrista @ http://creativeandcraftyteacher.blogspot.com/

Angela @ Angie's Paper Passion YOU ARE HERE!

Nadia @  http://www.withglitteringeyes.com/ 

Donna @  http://CarolinasCreativeCropper.blogspot.com/

Diane @ http://dianesdribble.blogspot.com/

Sara @  http://www.sarawandrews.com/

Michele @ www.michelegreen.com

Please come back tomorrow to see what else I have created for the Blog Hop. Until then, Happy Crafting,

Look What I Found at Hobby Lobby!

This may not be news to everyone but it was to me! As I was teaching a Cricut class at Hobby Lobby a while back, I told the class about embellishing their Cricut cuts with different items – embossing with the Cuttlebug, inking, pen work, popping up with pop dots, etc. I was getting ready to tell them about spray inks when I remembered that Hobby Lobby didn’t carry Glimmer Mists so I used Sheer Shimmer Spritz made by Tsukineko. Don’t get me wrong, I love these mists, especially the Shimmer and Frost, but they only come a a very limited selection of colors. So after the class, I HAD to go see what Hobby Lobby had on sale! At that time, they had all scrapbook papers and paper pads 50% off! So a pad of Core’dinations Nostalgia cardstock just jumped into my arms! But a few rows over my friend Pam who works in the scrapbooking department showed me what they just got in – GLIMMER MIST!!!

Yes! The same ones made by Tattered Angels! They came in 1oz bottles in a package with 4 bottles each.

The first package, below, is called Sundance and it contains Peach Delight, Lemon Zest, Apple Red, and Silver Sugar.

The second package has Heidi Swapp’s  name on it and contains the colors Electric Blue, Black Magic, Viva Pink, and Iridescent Gold.

They retail for 14.95. So since the pack of cardstock was 29.99 and I was going to spend the same amount on that (remember, the cardstock was 50 off!) I put the cardstock back and got the Sundance Glimmer Mists! - yea, I know I coulda waited for the 40% coupon, but like I said, I was going to spend the same amount of money anyways, so there! - I am going back to get the Heidi Swapp mists this week - yea, with a coupon this time! - because I really want to try the Black Magic and Viva Pink mists!

I {HEART} Hobby Lobby. They seem to really try to keep up with the new scrapbooking items. just so I can add to my collection!

Oh, and by the way, when I got home, guess what I already had in my cardstock stash, still unused? Right, the same pack of Core’dinations Nostalgia! So I made a very good choice!

Until next time, Happy Crafting,

Control Those Ink Pads!!!

In the process of redoing my craft room I realized that I had WAY too many ink pads –not that I’m complaining, mind you- and I didn’t have any kind of plan to tame my growing collection. Until I found these two tips. The  first tip was found at Rebel Inker. Stacey King has a pdf file that you can download with instructions for making this ink pad holder that uses only 2 pieces of foam core board. She used white foam core in her tutorial but I decided to use black and I got it at Hobby Lobby when it was on sale at 50% off- I’m ALWAYS looking for a good deal!

(Now I didn’t say that I was a master builder, ok? This is as good as it gets!)

This system was made to fit the Stampin’ Up! Ink pads but I found that with a little tweaking, you can use the basic pattern to create a number of configurations, not just for ink pads but for all kinds of storage.

It wasn’t that difficult to put together. I guess the hardest part was just cutting the foam core nice and straight. There are 5 compartments for the ink pads and each compartment holds 12 pads – again, these are SU pads. There is even a place to store your re-inkers at the top!

Because I bought the 2 pieces of foam core at 50% off, this project cost me about $5.00! Now what am I gonna do with the other 100 other brands of ink pads? LOL! More to come on that one. After I figure it out!

The other solution that I found was for my Tim Holtz Distress ink pads. –Hold on for a minute, AT! ok! I’m better now!

I like to use his inks with Inkssentials ink blending pads and Tim’s wooden tool. ok, did I just say that? That didn’t sound good -I’m really a good girl! But I didn’t want to get the inking pads & colors mixed up. So! I went back to Hobby Lobby –right, any excuse!- to purchase Velcro squares that were stick-on and some more ink blending foams.

I first stuck the rough side of the Velcro on the back of the ink pad and the softer side on the back of the blending foam.

Next step was to put the blending foam on the ink pad:

Now, when I need to use a certain color of ink, I grab it, take the blending foam off the back and stick it to the blending tool!

Even with the piece of Velcro between the pad and the tool, I have no problems at all getting a smooth, even color on my project. When I’m finished, I just reverse it – take the pad off the blending tool and place it back onto the bottom of the ink pad.

Easy as pie! Give it a try! If you do try either one of these storage tricks, please comment on this post and let me know. I just want to know if you like getting some tips & tricks on storage, scrapbooking and cricut related items also.

Dakota Bear, I hate to do this, but I can only give you until Wednesday, March 9th to contact me for your Blog Candy. After that date, I’ll have to pick another name!

Thanks for looking and until next time, Happy Crafting,

Glass Block Tutorial

Hey guys, here is the tutorial for the Glass Block that I first posted on Saturday.

I started with just a clear glass block that I bought at Hobby Lobby. It has an opening in the bottom to place your string of lights. Instead of using my glass etching cream on it like I had originally planned, I decided to spray the entire block with this -

It’s a Specialty Frosted Glass spray made by Rust-oleum that I also purchased at Hobby Lobby. After the glass is sprayed it almost looks like it’s been etched or frosted.

(You can barely see the string of white Christmas lights inside the block in this photo.)

The block will need a couple of coats of spraying but it dries pretty fast. I measured my glass block at about 7.25” square. Now, I use my Gypsy or Design Studio whenever I can because an image that looks square may not always be a perfect square. So with my G or DS I can unlink the height and width proportions to make an image perfectly square. Two things to remember – make sure the little chain link is NOT highlighted yellow on the Gypsy to unlink the height and width proportions and you may also need to use the Real Dial Size to get the correct size. I used an image from the Paper Lace cartridge and sized it to 7.25”x7.25”. I also used pink vinyl and transfer tape, both from Provo Craft.

Using this transfer tape will save you from countless headaches – trust me on this one! I set the pressure on my Cricut to Medium (3) and my blade depth to 2 –remember, I used my Gypsy so I couldn’t control the speed but slow the speed down to 3 also if you’re just using your machine alone. You just want to do a ‘kiss cut’ – cutting only the vinyl and not the paper backing. After you have your vinyl cut out, you need to “weed” it. That just means to pull off all the negative areas of the vinyl and leave the image on the paper backing. The best tool to use is the dental looking tool that comes in the Cricut Tool kit! I love that little thing!It’s probably one of my favorite and most used tools! Now cut a piece of the transfer tape a little bit larger than your image. Pull the transfer tape layers apart – there is the part with the grid on it and a tacky layer. Place the tacky piece over your design. Here is what it will look like with the tacky layer over the design:

Now burnish the tape onto the vinyl image by rubbing it with the stick that came with the vinyl or the transfer tape. You can also use an old credit card or something similar – just make sure that you get a good seal between the vinyl and the tape.

Then gently peel the transfer tape away from the vinyl paper backing. The vinyl image should come up with the transfer tape. If it doesn’t, put the tape back down and burnish it some more.

Place the transfer tape with the vinyl image over your project, in this case, the glass block, making sure that the vinyl image is centered correctly.

Once you have it where you want it, smooth it down so that you seal the vinyl to the glass. Then slowly peel the transfer tape off. Go slow – you want to avoid air bubbles!

If you do find some air bubbles just keep smoothing them out slowly with your finger being careful not to rip the vinyl.

And here is the finished project -

Just add a string of lights and plug it in! What I like about this method of decorating a glass block is that you can easily take the vinyl off and redecorate it with different images and in different colors of vinyl – even use multiple colors of vinyl!

See how nice it looks with the lights plugged in -

I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial. If you have any questions, please email me! Until next time, Happy Crafting!

Hobby Lobby Cricut Classes & A Shaker Card - Cindy Loo, George, and Gypsy Wanderings

My Cricut preview at Hobby Lobby last weekend went very well. I want to thank all of you who came by - I enjoyed meeting all of you! Remember, the first class is this Thursday, so go by Hobby Lobby on South Cooper in Arlington and sign up if you haven’t done so already. You must sign up at the Floral Dept. to reserve your seat. We’ll have a lot of fun and you’ll learn so much about your Cricut!
Well, I got to make some things this past week and the first one that I’m going to show you is my Shaker Card. I was inspired by Sheila at shesasassylady. I had planned to make my shaker card more like the one she had in her tutorial but when I got ready to make it I wasn’t home and didn’t have access to her blog. So I improvised and this is what I came up with -

I used my Gypsy to design this 5x5 card. The Cindy Loo cartridge was used for the frame and tree. I adhered a piece of transparency behind it and then used foam strips to pop the frame out. I added the foil leaf confetti before adhering the background (Did you recognize that piece of paper in the background? It’s a K and Company Halloween stack! It kinda reminded me of wind blowing the leaves). Also, I now think I have found something that I like to do as much as inking everything – embossing everything! The embossing folder that I used on the frame is D’vine Swirl and the Tim Holtz Woodgrain embossing folder was used on the tree. Everything was then inked. I also used Gypsy Wanderings and George for the layers on the inside of the card. Cindy Loo has so many nice frames that you could use for cards but they work great for shaker cards – something that I might not have looked at if I had had internet access! I have another shaker card in the works and I’ll post it when it’s finished. Interactive cards are so much fun to make and to give!

Until next time, Happy Crafting,

Cricut Classes at Hobby Lobby and Cartridge Blog Candy

Well guys, I’ve been away far too long and I miss blogging. I’ve been busy getting ready for my new Cricut classes starting this month at Hobby Lobby. This is such an exciting opportunity and I can’t wait. I will do a preview on Saturday, November 13th from 1 – 3 pm. My first class will be on Thursday, November 18th at 6pm. The Hobby Lobby is located in Arlington, TX at 4628 South Cooper. If you, or someone you know, needs a little help getting to know their Cricut or wants to get a little more creative with their machine, please drop by the store to sign up or email me – angiespaperpassion AT gmail DOT com.

Now for some bad (and good) news. The winner of the Happy Hauntings cartridge never sent me her info! So I will be choosing another name. If you didn’t get a chance to leave a comment last time to win, here’s your chance. I know that Halloween is over but if you’re anything like me, you still have a ton of Trick or Treating photos to scrapbook! So leave me a comment and I will pick another winner on Monday! If you want more details on this give away just click HERE!

Until next time, Happy Crafting,