Circle Blog entry for August

This month our challenge was to create a scene using Cricut cuts. I did a double page 12X12 layout of my husband and me enjoying a day at the beach on Galveston Island in Texas.

I had a lot of fun doing this challenge. My photos are not of good quality because we just used a throw away camera. Making the scene helped make my photos look a LOT better than just matting them on the paper.

The cartridges I used were Pop Up Neighborhood, Create a Critter, Life's a Beach, & H20. Plus, I finally remembered to Cuttlebug my clouds before I stuck them on my layout! (D'vine Swirls) I l-o-v-e the little plane, too!

Cricut Circle's weekly contest #37

This time our challenge is as follows: "All week long the Cricut Circle Design Team has been showing you new and different techniques to use with your Cricut Cuts (check back tomorrow, there is still one more!). . . now it’s your turn! Create a project of your choice (Scrapbook page, mini album, card, home decor . . . it’s up to you!) including one of the techniques we have showcased this week. Let me recap for you! Monday, Kristen used letter stickers to create her own textured patterned paper of sorts to cut shapes from. Tuesday, Suzanne cut her shapes from vellum and used her Cuttlebug machine to emboss them. On Thursday, Jennifer used beads and glitter to dress up her Cricut cuts to create a Keepsake Photo Thank You card. Today, Deanna shows you a crayon resist technique with spray mists. Finally, tomorrow Michele Kovack will be back to show you how to add shading and dimension to your Cricut cuts using Copic markers! Choose one of these techniques and then apply it to your own project! We can’t wait to see what you do!"

I did a layout of myself when I received my A. S. from Boise State. I have spent the last 10 years thinking it didn't count for much, since its not a bachelor's degree, but, no more! I'm going to celebrate it because I worked hard for it. {I was born an English major - I used to get library passes in high school on dissection days, which does not usually lead to Science degrees ;) }

I chose to use glitter and beads to enhance my project. I used black Stickles on the black cuts of my flowers to give them a little life. I centered each one with tiny glass beads, turned on their sides, to mirror the black dots in the ribbon. Usually, I try to hide the holes in the beads, but I like this effect, too. I also used glass beads shaped like leaves as accents to the flowers. They are clear and don't show up very well so I dabbed green Stayz On ink on their backs.

I used the Mother's Day Bouquet cartridge, which I love, for all the flowers, and Lyrical Letters for the font. I tried to plan out the exact flowers to use but, in the end, I just followed the advice from the cartridge's packaging and layered my favorite shapes together to create my flowers. Good advice. I do have to say, though, that I hate that I dropped the big flower on the left down too high up on the page - it makes the pages unbalanced :( but that's kind of my thing ("Everything would be perfect except for that one thing!")

Cricut Circle's July monthly challenge entry

First, a personal note: Pam and Dawn, don't read this post yet or you'll spoil your surprise! Stop it right now.

This month's challenge is titled "Let's Eat!"

I'm going to a pajama crop tomorrow with my besties and I'm going to surprise them with the BEST THING I HAVE EVER EATEN - pig candy. I found out about this treat of treats from a series of books written by HRH Jill Conner Browne (http://sweetpotatoqueens.com).

The challenge requirements are: Create a project of your choice with a BBQ, Picnic, or Patio theme AND use a gingham or check pattern somewhere on your projects. Your project must include atleast 2 different Cricut Image Cuts.

I made labels for individual bags. My cuts were made from these cartridges: Mickey and Friends Font, Elegant Edges for the white base, Animal Kingdom (piggy face), and Everyday Paper Dolls (piggy's bib is a bandana.)

I know technically we're not eating this outside but it is h-o-t here. 100+ degrees hot. I would hate for us to melt before we get to eat our pig candy! So we're going to have an indoor picnic like smart girls.

Now that this project is done I have to go sew the sequins on our capes :)

My First Place Win

I am very proud to say that I won the June Sketch Contest at my local scrapbooking store!! The usual end to the contest fell during the July 4th rush and I didn't hear from them so, I assumed for the longest time that I had lost but, to my happy surprise, they had just not contacted the winners yet. Here's my entry:

I worked off of this sketch:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150198295004523&set=a.212634019522.128306.134485994522&type=1&theater

I used the Cricut Old West and Yee Haw cartridges (that I got FOR FREE at the Texas Stampede - gotta love that!) I spent more time layering the cowgirl images from the Yee Haw cartridge than I wanted to but I really wanted a specific look to them. It meant cutting the layers several times and then cutting them up & using bits of each to create the right look.

My favorite part of this layout is the matching bling I added to the hat in my daughter's shadow in this photo. I also really like the colors of the photos. I used an editing effect in iPhoto on my Mac called, 'Antique,' to make them look more vintage, which muted the reds and softened the-too bright sunlight.

I used my trusty iRock for the bling and even used it on some iron-on bling intended for use on clothes. I used silver metal squares as nail studs on the wagon wheel. They're about 1/4 inch tall so they took a few extra seconds for the iRock to heat up the glue but it worked! You can see one in the upper left of the above photo. I can't remember what brand they are; they're meant to be ironed onto jeans. I got them on clearance at JoAnn's last year. The only caution I have is to not press down hard, (I flattened a few studs,) but just let the iRock do its job. I'm going to pull a few other types out of my stash and try them out on scrap paper. Nice to have an avenue for a wider variety of bling and not be stuck with just round ones found in the scrapbooking aisle.

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 :)

Another second place win for me!

I placed second at Signed Sealed Delivered's (in Rogers, Arkansas-my local scrapbooking shop,) monthly sketch contest. I did a 2 page 12x12 layout of my daughter meeting Ariel at Disney in Orlando.

I used the Mickey Font cartridge for my mouse ear shapes and my Gypsy to weld them together to create a couple of borders. Ariel, Flounder and the flowers came from the Disney Dreams Come True cartridge.

My favorite thing about this layout is the mouse ear hat I created that mimics my daughter's hat. I wanted to really highlight it because Ariel talked about it with my daughter and was so charming and funny.

I cut the mouse ear hat shape from the Mickey Font cartridge to use as a base. I then cut a circle (from George & Basic Shapes I think,) a little bigger than the hat. I trimmed about 1/3 off the circle and sprayed it with water then draped it over the top of a can of Magic Sizing to dry. (Note: I did not use the Magic Sizing other than for the shape of the can.) When it was dry, I made a crown with bling to mimic the real hat and glued it in place over the Cricut cut hat. I stuffed a couple of cotton balls in it and then lined the bottom with paper to hold them in.

I used some fancy material from Joann's to create a veil. The result was a pretty cool 3-D hat for my layout.

Weekly Challenge #34: Father’s Day Card Sketch

This is my entry for the Cricut Circle weekly challenge.   The photo doesn't show very many details of the card. I'm having issues with my computer and camera so I took this one on my phone (in bad lighting because I was too lazy to move to another room,) and emailed it to myself to get it on the computer.

My Cricut cuts are from Elegant Edges, which I got at the Cricut Stampede.  (It immediately became one of my favorites.)   I cut the same shape twice, once at 3 inches and again at 1 1/4 inches, and then layered them together. I added some red bling to the smaller shape to mirror a pattern in the paper of the bigger shape.  

I used my Cuttlebug on the background piece in order to add a little texture. The design matches the pattern in the little rectangle that has the yellow bling. It shows up much better in person, thank goodness.

Of course, I used Tim Holtz' Distress Ink in Vintage Photo to ink my edges to make them separate from each other. That's really my 'go-to' ink. Everyone loves that one, don't they? I also pop-dotted my layers on top of my Cuttlebugged background. Doesn't that look just great on a card? I love it. Two simple steps that bring a card to life.

{Grrr, I just checked this posting - the colors are really bad in this photo! They're actually orange, green, and a little blue. I've got to get that computer/camera problem fixed!!

May 2011 Cricut Circle Monthly Blog Challenge: Tic Tac Toe Challenge

The Cricut Circle Blog monthly challenge for us Circlets was very interesting this month!  We had to choose a row of requirements (either an up & down pattern, side to side pattern, or a diagonal pattern, of three) from a tic-tac-toe board.  I used the top row, side-to-side, which included using a sun-shape, using my Gypsy to weld an image together, & using buttons on my project.

I went to a marathon crop at my local scrapbooking store (Signed Sealed Delivered, Rogers, Arkansas) for National Scrapbooking Day and received these papers and the materials for the hammock, with various other elements, in a kit there.  I decided to complete the layout in a way that would fit the Tic-Tac-Toe challenge.


The sun shape from the kit came from the Life is a Beach cartridge, as did the palm trees.  I blinged it with Stickles & also used my Cuttlebug Swiss Dots folder to emboss my sun image, a fourth in the list of requirements for the contest- not necessary, but fun all the same.


The buttons were a happy coincidence in their coloration as I had just purchased them at SSD's warehouse sale not too long ago.


For my welded image, I used my Gypsy to weld a 'tag' shape to the top of a lower case letter 'L,' which made a sign for me to write on.  It reads, "Stampede Recovery Area."  I will use pictures of me & my bestie Pam (http://www.crop-tastic.blogspot.com/) at the Stampede in this layout.


I finished the layout off with a little Gypsy Bug, from the Cricut Everyday cartridge, relaxing in the hammock with a tropical drink in hand.

Second Place Winner

Signed Sealed Delivered monthly sketch contest for April 2011


I won 2nd place in the monthly sketch contest at my local scrapbooking store, Signed Sealed Delivered, out of Rogers, Arkansas (look them up on facebook.)  I did a double page, 12X12 layout featuring our newest family member, Lola, our 5 month old Havanese puppy.


I was pleased with my paper choices; all the patterned paper was bought on clearance (my personal addiction.)  I love to use what I have in my stash to create something worth sharing.  I thought the colors were very pretty together.  I am also proud of my photography in this layout. I love taking good pictures and if I get a better-than-good one every once in a while, like the one in the upper right hand corner, I am thrilled.

I recently took a flower making class at Signed Sealed Delivered that featured a paper flower.  I used that as inspiration for my layout and accented my flowers with glass jewelry-making pieces I found at my local Walmart, for very little money.  Gotta love that :)

I couldn't have done the finishing touches of this layout without my Cricut, Cuttlebug, iRock, and Tim Holtz Distress Ink.  Correction: I wouldn't have wanted to do this layout without my Cricut, Cuttlebug, iRock, and Tim Holtz Distress Ink.  

My Cricut Circle Monthly Challenge entry

APRIL Monthly Challenge: Reuse, Repurpose, Recycle!

The Challenge: Create a project of your choice and reuse, recycle or repurpose 3 items on your creation. Project must include atleast 2 different Cricut Image Cuts.

For my project, I made a canister to hold the marker flags we use for our puppy's housebreaking training aids.  I needed something that would sit on the low wall next to our front door that would be easier to grab the flags out of as we go out with Lola.  We had them just sitting outside before this, but, she runs fast, once she's out the door, and sometimes we miss grabbing one as we flash by them. 

I used an empty Crystal Light container for my canister and paper that I had in my scrap stash from a layout I did last Spring.  (It is some of my all time favorite because of the colors.  I'm glad I finally found a use for it and to get to see it everyday is a plus.)  The marker flags are from Lowe's; they are the ones used to mark where underground utilities are buried.  I used the Disney Mickey Font cartridge for the words and welded the letters on my Gypsy inside a shape from my Elegant Edges cartridge.  I cut the shape out in 'shadow' as well for the background.  I blinged it out with metal studs using my iRock.  The little puppy was a cut I made just a little while ago at a crop-I made several sizes to choose from for a card and this was one of the leftovers.  Its from the Designer's Calendar cartridge.  I was lucky and found some flocked paper in my local scrapbooking store's scrap stash and used it for the puppy.  I added black highlights, so to speak, with a Zig marker and added a metal iRock stud for her tag.


I loved this project :)  It was fun to work on and I felt great making something out of nothing.