Friday, June 24, 2011

June Cricut Circle Monthly Challenge entry

This month I actually made 2 projects for the Circle's "On the Road Again!" challenge. The first one I am very proud of (not to take anything away from the second project - but more on that later.) It's a 'break the ice' book for my daughter to take to Girl Scout horse camp on Sunday.

I really wanted her to have something that would give her a way to start conversations and share a little bit about herself with her cabin mates. She's seen it, and complimented me on it ;) , but I'm not letting her fill it out until the car ride to camp. She tends to be 'over it already,' so to speak, if I have a 2 part project for her and start the first part too soon. Not in a negative way, of course, she just feels done with it and has already found something new to be excited about. Basically, I've learned to time certain things right.

Anyway, this is the first project:








I used the Yee-Haw Lite cartridge and the Old West cartridge for the main theme of this file folder book since its for a horse riding camp. I was very lucky to find a shape that said "Saddle Up" on the Old West cartridge for my front page since that's the name of the camp she's going to attend! (She's using this shape to make SWAPS for swapping, too.)

I created a personal journaling space on the back. On the inside, I created four tags that insert into the pockets. I asked my daughter to come up with 4 questions she would like to ask her bunk mates in order to get to know them better. She decided on #1 Where are you from? (I cut out shapes from the 50 States cartridge of the states she has lived in), #2 Have you ever been to horse camp before? (Old West cartridge,) #3 Do you have any pets? (shapes of animals from Everyday Paper Dolls), and #4 What are your favorite hobbies? (shapes from Old West and Everyday Paper Dolls.)

I used chipboard in the tags because I wanted a firm writing surface. My daughter is going to fill out her answers on them on the car ride to camp and then ask the others girls to do so at camp. This way, they see what she had to say about herself as well.

My favorite thing about this book is that I adhered to part of the Girl Scout Law when I made it. Part of the Law says to "use resources wisely," and I applied that to my project. I made this book out of my scrap stash. I used 1 extra piece of new white cardstock to complete the tags (they are reversible) because I ran out of white in my stash, but everything else, from the shapes to the twine wrapped around it, are from leftover pieces of other projects. The file folder is made up of recycled paper, too, so it fits right in.

Now that I have finished tooting my own horn, I'll show my second project that actually made it into the Circle challenge. This project came about from a conversation with a fellow Circlet that felt entries to challenges should follow the guidelines more strictly than my first project may have done.

While I felt comfortable with what I designed as fitting the challenge of, "Create a project of your choice that will help you or your kids on that long summer road trip. It can be a travel game, travel activity, organizer, snack holder, whatever!," the introductory paragraph to the project said specifically to gear your project toward use in your car. (It says, "For a lot of us summertime means ROAD TRIP! For this challenge, we want you to create something . . . ANYTHING for your car! It can be a travel game, travel activity, organizer, whatever! Let your imagination run wild.")

For her, the part about creating something specifically for your car was important, as in not something that you can (and probably would usually,) do someplace else. She felt that maybe projects like my Camp Saddle Up book were pushing the limits a tiny bit, I think because projects like mine were meant to have the bulk of them used somewhere else besides n the car. Now, again, I feel my project would have worked because I thought all of it up after reading the challenge and am still going to have my daughter fill it out on the way to camp (plus, read the other girls entries to me on the way home,) but I see her point. And I am very glad she talked with me and planted the seed in my head because otherwise I might not have made this:



A little purse for my Gypsy's car charging cord. Totally stinkin' cute, right? I used a purse shape from Tags, Bags, Boxes and More (cut at a height of 7 inches from my Gypsy,) and a Gypsy emblem from Cricut Everyday. Much simpler that my file folder book but I love it! This way I can grab the right cord instead of fishing through the mangled pile that we usually have on road trips. Now my daughter has something to make her road trip go a little better and, I have something for mine.

So, thank you, fellow Circlet, for pushing me to try harder :)

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