Simple Cards

I had a long wait at O'Hare Airport last week when I was coming home from the  CHA supershow. I found these little desk areas with outlets so travelers could recharge their electronics. I had just discovered my camera had flat-lined, so I took advantage. Since there was a little desk, I decided to do a little rubberstamping as I had stocked up (mostly with Papertrey Ink) at the show.  I stamped a lot of things to cut out later (since I didn't have scissors seeing I was at the airport lol).

I made this card with the On My Couch stamp set. Inside I used the "need a couch day"  and "potato optional" sentiments. The furniture and pillow were stamped at the airport by the way.

I used the Everyday Button Bits stamp set for this card.  I positioned the wings so one button hole would act as an eye. I really love these stamps, and the cardstock is dreamy.

Can I get a woot?

My regular computer is not fixed yet, but I'm learning how to do things without photoshop elements lol.  I finally have an avatar. I might have overthought it, but I do like how it came out.  I am prone to falling and I'm a huge fan of Gingy in the Shrek movies. I used the sticker feature in the "Just Because" Cricut cartridge, and lots of stickles (Not my gumdrop buttons!).  I used the Mickey Font cartridge for the "h"s.

I have a small backlog of projects to post. Keep your fingers crossed for me : D.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Snap lol

Monday I turned on my computer and went to get my coffee. When I came back in the room, there was an acrid aroma of electrical issues in the air. My fears were confirmed when I saw tendrils of smoke coming out of the back of the computer. With luck it will be examined by my computer whiz nephew the weekend after next. Ironically I was just getting ready to back up the computer. Keep your fingers crossed that the harddrives are ok.

I'm typing on the tv computer (in lieu of cable, we watch online). It works great for watching tv, not really comfortable for typing. On the plus side, I don't need my glasses to read the screen thanks to my keyboard/mouse combination that works at least 50 feet away from the computer lol.

Sisterly Pride - Graduation Bouquet

Ok nothing in this post was made by me, because this post is all about my Oldest Little Sister's (yep, yep I'm the oldest of four) Graduation Bouquet for our niece. May I add, it's totally awesome to have someone else in the family who's loving the Cricut (she even bought a Gypsy).

So, without further ado, the Graduation Bouquet : D.

The cartridges used are Teardrop, Paper Pups, Walk in my Garden and Straight from the Nest. The grass is nestled in a sheet of cardstock and stands at the back of the bouquet against the glass.

One of the dog's has a long flowy tail, so my sister free-handed a tail with scissors with lots and lots of fringe.

The tassel is from Jolee, but the stickers that came with it didn't have any zeros, so my sister had to dig through her stash (this is why we need a stash lol).

This turned out soooo great! My sister used a little tiny rhinestone for the bird's eye.  She totally rocked the cutting of this cage!! So now you can see why I'm so proud of her work (plus all my sisters are awesome people). Leave her some comment love if you can : D.

Tanks A Lot

Good golly it's been a busy month!! I can't believe the month is almost over. I have a few projects to post, but I'll do them one at a time.

I had this card in my head a long time before I could actually make it. I used a z-card (6" x 12" scored at 6", and 3"). I forgot to photograph it before I sent it off, I remembered to scan it but it was longer than my scanner. But you can get the idea of it file. I used some glitter paper and lots of stickles.

The "tanks a lot" folds behind the tank on the second 3" section and opens up.

The gypsy is file is here. The tank is from Stand and Salute, I think the cloud is from Graphically Speaking, the eye and smile are from Once Upon a Princess, and the font is Alphalicious.
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My Design Debut at TheBugBytes: Scrapbook page or Wall Art?

I'm deeply honored that Pam aka TheBugBytes asked me to design something for her blog.

Sometimes scrapbook pages are just too wonderful to keep in a book. So why not take out a page that will "stand" on its own and put it on the wall. Of course you can also make things that you only intend to display on the wall. If you want to rotate your displays, you can store the ones you aren't using in a scrapbook lol.

Because I couldn't get a better picture in the frame (I should have done this outside when it was light out lol), I took another picture of the layout out of the frame since the glass just doesn't come out of that shadow frame!

Layers are something I hadn't fully utilized on my Gypsy until I made this project. In fact, I stopped using them all together after the Thanksgiving/Christmas update that rendered them unusable (and I didn't update until latest version). So when Pam told me about what layers could do now (especially the moving them around part), I knew I had to start really using them.

So without further ado, here's my take on a layout for displaying the cousin side of the family tree. You can download the gypsy file here. For this project, I used the Heritage cart and my Gypsy.

In a complete turnaround of my typical Gypsy usage, each aspect of this file is on it's own separate layer (have I mentioned that I love the new layers??).

I usually use the Return to Design option after the cut is finished. That way I have a chance to doublecheck the cut before I take it off the mat. I just use the buttons around the cut button to move the cutting blade assembly (I usually keep a cart in my Expression).

Since I used the same paper for the title and the frame, and because I hit the Return to Design button after the title cut, I just went to the frame layer and moved it near the cousins to save paper and hit cut. Using the Gypsy means I don't have to worry where the cutting blade is when the cutting starts (knock wood lol).

Here's the breakdown of the Heritage cuts, Gypsy techniques and papers by layer.

Title
Heritage: Frame Feature (row 1, image 8 on p. 31), Word Feature "Cousins" (row 4, image 7 on p. 60)
paper: dark brown cardstock from stash
Gypsy techniques: "Cousins" height 1", Frame height 2.29". Welded "Cousins" inside the frame and used hide contour feature to hide the holes on both sides of frame.

Since I used the same paper for this and the frame, after I cut this out (and used "Return to Design") I just went to the frame layer and cut that (after I moved it to an optimal paper-saving location). After I glued this to the title background, I distressed it with a fine grain sandpaper.

Title Background
Heritage: Frame Feature (row 1, image 8 on p. 31), height 2.29".
Paper: the only name I could find on this was "handmade", but I have two different pads with this in the left hand corner.
Gypsy techniques: I used the hide contour feature to hide everything except the outside contour.

I cut the frame background right after this because it used the same paper.

Frame
Heritage: Charm Feature (row 4, image 2 on page 55), height 5" (adjust to fit picture).
Paper: dark brown cardstock from stash.
Gypsy techniques: flipped upside down and hid the hole with hide contour.

Frame Background
Heritage: Charm Feature shift (row 4, image 2 on page 55), height 5".
Paper: the only name I could find on this was "handmade", but I have two different pads with this in the left hand corner
Gypsy techniques: flipped upside down and hid the hole.

Tree
Heritage: Basic Feature (row 1, image 1, p. 24), height 11"
Paper: Tim Coffey by K&Co.

Tree Background
Heritage: Shadow Feature (row 1, image 1, p. 24), height 11"
Paper: Best of Brenda Walton by K&Co.

Leaves
Heritage: Basic Feature shift (row 1, image 1, p. 24)
Decided the design didn't need them, but forgot to take it out of the file lol.

Background
Paper:  Ivory & Black by K&Co. This was the paper I "had" to use, the starting point for it all lol. Can you see the sparkle in those flowers?

Teacher Thank You Gift

 

This is a thank you gift for one of DD's favorite teachers ever. What you can't see in the picture is that there are two small cards on the inside that slide into pockets. I left them blank so there would be room for all the kids to sign them.  The Venetian Blind Book is the project from Club Scrap's Jubilee Collection, except the embellishment on the front is made with the Cricut.

To make the embellishment, I rocked the Cricut Old Skool, aka no Designer's Studio nor Gypsy (of course I forgot to take a picture with the Fit to Length button activated, but you can see it above the Center Point Button. As a P.S. let me add the amber glow is from my Champagne Expression). The mat and the sentiment are both from the Calligraphy Collection. Above Rubies Studio's Cricut A to Z is awesome for learning about these features by the way.

First, I measured (first things first, eh? lol). Ok, first I had to dig out my Calligraphy Collection cartridge from the giant bin in which most of them are now stored since I bought a Gypsy).

Since the first thing I was going to do was make the mat, I moved the cutting blade to a central location on the paper and hit the center point button and the fit to length button. I set the height to 4 3/4 inches (which the Cricut will transform into the width of the cut), replaced the cutting blade with the Cricut marker (with a piece of scrap paper under it in case of accidental dropping onto the paper). I set the speed to 2 and the pressure to 2.

In Calligraphy Collection I used Image1-s on page 70, so I hit the shift button, the Matrimony feature and the image button. When it was done calculating the height, I pressed the cut button. After the image had been drawn, I replaced the marker (again with the scrap paper) with the cutting blade (change the pressure to the appropriate to what is to the paper) and hit the repeat last button. I could have drawn the sentiment, but then I would have wouldn't have been able to use the repeat last button and I would have had to remember to reset the fit to length button.

Then I replaced the cutting blade with the marker (remembering to change the speed and pressure), and turned off the Fit to Length button (but leave the Center Point button on). Again using the Calligraphy Collection cart, set the height to 1 1/4, double-checked to make sure the Matrimony feature button was selected I used the Thank You sentiment on p. 74 and hit cut.

After I took the cut off the Cricut mat, I used a Sakura Glaze pen to write the Thank you in the middle of the marker lines so the marker makes a shadow effect for the glaze pen.

It was fun to do everything "manually", but I really had to focus on what I was doing. I've been rather spoiled by the Gypsy lol. The Gypsy is more the set-it and forget-it (except for the pressure and speed which it prompts you to doublecheck) in that all the design work is done before I get to my Cricut so I don't have to recheck the shift button, feature button, height, etc.