Playing With Paper

In protest of all the snow we've had in Oklahoma recently and for Challenge Me Monday #47 at Fantabulous Cricket, I created a "Welcome Spring" sign for the front door.  Actually, the past couple of days, we've had gorgeous weather.  I used Florals Embellished for the background, Feeling Groovy for the font, and the little pink flowers I made with Accent Essentials.  The little girl is from a clip art CD I had.  I used regular ol' cardstock for everything. Hope you enjoy and have a great weekend! BTW - you can find the weekly Challenge Me Monday at Fantabulous Cricket http://fantabulouscricut.blogspot.com/search/label/Challenge%20Me%20Monday

Here's my Valentine containers for holding homemade chocolate truffles for some very special people.  The actual container is the Nut Cup from Tags, Bags, Boxes, and More Cricut Cartridge.  I used felt stickers on three sides and the "sweet love" stamp on one side.  I made the tissue paper garland bordering the top and inked the edges of the container with red ink.

I made these thank you notes and tags for baby shower favors for a friend.  The onesie cut came from the New Arrivals Cricut cartridge, paper is Recollections from Michael's.  I inked the edges of the onesie and card with blue ink and used a blue gel pen to make it look like the little duck was stitched on. The "Thank You Very Much" stamp was one out of the Dollar tower basket at, you guessed it, Michael's. I'm looking forward to some warmer weather and a chance for some of this snow to melt off.  We don't normally have it hanging around this long!  Have a great weekend!

Here's another Valentine Banner.  This one is for my friend, Emily, who LOVES owls! I used the handy Gypsy to get it all laid out before cutting.  I have no clue what cartridge the background came from (its an awful thing to not remember!).  The letters are from Cindy Loo.  I used "mini-skittles" hand-dyed with alcohol inks as accents.  The owl stamps are from two different i-cling sets.  Derwent watercolor pencils added the color to them.  I like to stamp with Staz-on ink so it doesn't bleed when I use the watercolor pencils.  The paper is from American Crafts Metropolitan pack.  Ribbon is Celebrate It brand from Michael's.  Enjoy!

I hope everyone is safe, warm, and dry and inside.  Oklahoma is still not thawed out from our Monday night/Tuesday blizzard.  Yes, I said blizzard.  In Oklahoma.  I've lived here all my life and experienced less than a handful of them, thank goodness.  I'm definitely a warm weather Okie and can't wait to open the swimming pool once its warm enough! Here's the youtube video for making the little flowers.  As you can tell, I'm not "blog" savvy quite yet, so you'll have to click on the link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-X54ayUi40   I used Accent Essentials cartridge.   The petal cut is (Accent 24s) cut at 1 inch.  If you use the Auto Fill function on your Expression, you get 100 per page which will make 24 flowers.  The leaves on bottom are also from Accent Essentials cart (Accent33s) also cut at 1 inch.  I used Memento inks to ink the edges of SOME of the petals and ALL of the leaves.  The leaves I actually ...

Valentine's Day is just around the corner.  Its hard to believe January is almost over.  Here's one of the Valentine banners I've created this year. I used Cricut's Cindy Loo cartridge for the actual banner pieces.  The edges are daubed with Adirondack Gold acrylic paint dauber to give them a "frame" effect. The letters are cut from the Storybook cartridge and the cute little girl hiding behind the heart is from K & Company's Valentine Ephemera set. The cupid is also from K & Company, I think she's being sneaky trying to hide behind the bow!  The flowers started out as cuts from Accent Essentials and I layered and "fluffed" them (there's a YouTube video on how to do this.  I'll have to find the link and post it to give credit).  They were made from cardstock out of a multicolor pack.  Other papers used:  Anna Griffin (pink and white scrolls) for the background, euphoria/eden from Basic Grey for the shadow part of the le...

Lori asked the difference between Sure Cuts A Lot vs. Make The Cut.  To be quite honest, I'm not sure as I don't have Sure Cuts A Lot and haven't worked with it.  I've had Make The Cut for almost a year and find it very easy to design in.  Additionally, it seems like it is updated quite frequently and so far, there hasn't been a charge for the updates.  I LOVE the "Join" feature.  Its similar to "Welding" in Cricut Design Studio.  However, the project I was working on was a banner.  I used circles to create the scallops around the edges and welded them.  I needed holes in the top to run the ribbons through.  The "Join" feature allowed me to basically attach the circles to my other shapes so I could copy the whole mess and not have to move it piece-meal and make sure I got them in the right spot.  Wish I would have taken pictures of the Halloween Banner before I gave it to my mother.  But, I didn't and her darling dogs decided to eat...