Quick Tip Tuesday–Fantabulous Cricut Blog

Good morning crafty friends! As you may know, I am on the Design Team for the Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog but I also write the Quick Tip post there every Tuesday. You can go back to see all of my Quick Tip posts HERE! But today I decided to also posts my tips here on my blog. For the month of May I will be sharing crafting tips AND organizing tips each week. This week we’ll talk about brads and eyelets.

If you are anything like me, you are always looking for new ways to organize your stash of scrapping supplies. I remember when I started this journey many years ago, my entire stash fit into a small 8” x 10” container, LOL, but today not only do I have an entire craft room but supplies from that room have somehow started overflowing into others rooms! (No, really, I have NO IDEA how that happened!!!)

So my first quick tip has to do with brads and eyelets. Yes, I think we all still have them in our stash whether you want to admit it or not! I personally like to keep my brads and eyelets in containers that I can grab and go. So I separate mine by color (or color family) and put them in those little Tic Tac containers then those go into a slightly bigger clear box. I have one clear box for big brads and one that contains mini brads. I use this same system for my eyelets.

If I’m going to a crop, I can just grab the box that I want or just take a few of the smaller boxes containing the colors and/or sizes that I need.

And speaking of brads, did you know that you can take plain silver or gold brads and change them to any color that you want? Well, as long as you have some different colored embossing powders and VersaMark!

First, take your plain brad and dip it into your VersaMark pad.

Next dip it into your color of choice of embossing powder.

Now heat your brad with a heat gun. Make sure you use a pair of crafting tweezers to do this last step! After it’s heated, you can dip it again into the embossing powder while it’s still hot and heat it again to create a thicker coating.

Now you have a brad with a custom color! Try experimenting with different colors of embossing powders.

Here are a few different colors that I tried. I used Platinum, Interference Blue, and Green.

How do you store your brads and eyelets? Comment below and share your storage solutions. Next week I’ll be back with another organizing and crafting tip.

Tomorrow I’ll have another Mother’s Day card to share. It was made using another tutorial from Split Coast Stampers so please be sure to stop by! Thanks!

Until next time, Happy Crafting,

More Stamped Cards to Share and The Winner from My Fabulous and 50th Birthday Blog Hop!

First I wanted you to know that I will start sharing my Design Studio and Gypsy files soon! I only have a few now but I am designing more and more and I’d be delighted to share them with you. I’ll keep you updated!

I wanted to share a few more of my stamped cards with you. The first two were stamped with Stampin’ Ups Fifth Avenue Floral stamp set. I think that the sentiment on the left card was made with a hostess stamp set. I love these stamps and use them a lot!

 

In the next set of cards, the one on the left is very special to me – this is the very first card that I made with SU stamps and ink pads! When I saw this stamp set and the background stamp I was hooked – bought both sets on the spot! did you notice that the flower stem is upside down? You didn’t? Then I shoulda kept my mouth shut! lol It wasn’t long afterwards that I became a Demo for SU. The background stamp is En Français and I can’t even remember the name of the other set and since I am still re-doing my scrapbook room – yes, STILL -, most of my stamps are boxed up right now.  The card on the right was one of my demo cards using the Pocket Silhouettes stamp set and the Upsy Daisy set for the sentiment.

 

On the next card (left), I stamped the  flowers from the Petal Pizzazz set, punched them out and adhered them with foam dots. The sentiment is from the Sincere Salutations set – a great set! The card on the right was stamped with Bird on a Branch set.

 

The first card was done for a card swap and there are no SU sets used on it. I used an embossing folder on the background and a watercolor technique on the stamped image. I just love the next card. It was created with only punches! I used circles, ovals, a flower, and a heart to create this Easter Bunny!

 

The card on the right was made using Bird on a Branch again and Birds and Branches strip die cut from Sizzix. One of my all-time favorite stamp sets is the one that I used to create the first card – Baroque Motifs! The technique used on this is a faux 3-D shadow technique. You need the same color of cardstock and ink color (that’s one of the things that I like about SU – everything matches!), a white pigment ink pad and a Stamp-A-Ma-Jig! Stamp the image in the white pigment ink and let it dry. Then using the SAMJ tool, re-stamp the same image again with a dye ink in the same color as the cardstock , just a slight bit off center from the first one. (see the next photo for a close up) It looks very dimensional but without the bulk – great for mailing.

 

The next card (left) was stamped with the Bloomin’ Beautiful stamp set. I stamped the image on watercolor paper with a VersaMark stamping pad, sprinkled it with gold embossing powder, then heat embossed it. Then using my ink pads and an aqua painter (a plastic paint brush filled with water), I water colored the image in. I used the Razzle Dazzle set and a scalloped die cut to make the next card.

 

Ok, last set! I promise! First card – I stamped the image  - Inspired by Nature – with a VersaMark ink pad and heat embossed it with white embossing powder. Second card – used my favorite stamp set again, Baroque Motifs, and the Baroque Border using the Stampin’ Around Wheel. Those two strips on the top left of the card were made with the Word Window punch – a very versatile punch!

Thanks for taking the time to look at my work. I hope that you enjoyed the cards and get some ideas from them!

Now for the winner of my Fabulous & 50 blog candy!!!

 

And the winner of a new Nifty Fifties Cricut cartridge is………..

(drum roll please!)

 

Dakota Bear!

Dakota Bear said...

Happy Birthday!
The box is beautiful. Thank you for the great tutorial. I'm looking forward to seeing how you did the glass.

Dakota Bear, please email your name and address to me so that I can get your cartridge in the mail! Thanks to everyone for the warm and wonderful birthday comments! I appreciate each and every one of them! Until next time, Happy Crafting,