Summer Harvest Just For You

 

Happy Friday everyone and welcome to another Go to Galz Challenge over at Cardz TV.  The week our projects are all about celebrating the summer's harvest.  For my take on this challenge I want to share a quick and simple card I threw together using some of the older cartridges.  

 

For this one I used:

Accent Essentials for the scalloped square

Pooh and Friends for the Apple basket

Doodlecharms for the Apples

 

The stamped sentiment is from the Cardz TV Stamps set "Love in a Jar".  And now that you've seen my project for this week, be sure to create your own, link up and play along with us.  I can't wait to see what you make for this week's theme.

Butterfly Pop Up

A couple of years ago Sizzix came out with this really nice looking scalloped pop-up die.  However, I didn't want to spend the money on this particular die so I took the Cricut challenge to see if I could recreate it.  Surprisingly enough I was successful and this is the first card I made using this pop-up.

 

To create the pop-up design I used:

•  Accent Essentials for the scalloped circle cut at 6"
• George for the placement of cuts to create the pop outs/ups

For the other cuts on my card I used:

Home Decor for my flourishes (coming off the top and bottom of the scallop)

April Showers for the other butterflies, trees, worm and spring banner

I even decided to break out my Cuttlebug for this one and used the Cuttlebug for the blue and green butterflies - I have the cut and emboss butterfly set

Team....

Today I have another DT challenge for Just A Scrappin' to share with you, and I have to admit that when I saw the directive for this one I was like "are you kidding me?". I had no idea what I was going to do for this one, but in the end it all came together and did so beautifully.

So what was the directive you ask. Well, we had to create a project with Volleyball as the theme. But it didn't stop there - we had to use the colors maroon, white and gold. Now this part wasn't too problematic for me because those are the school colors for our local highschool (from which I graduated). But wait, it didn't stop there either. We also had to use brads on our project.

Think, think, and think some more. Whatever in the world could I do? As I looked through the pages of my Sports Mania booklet I saw this cut with the hands up over the volleyball net and I heard the word "TEAM" yell out in my head. So off to the internet I went in search of a quote for teamwork and from there everything fell in to place.

As I mentioned earlier, the cut with the volleyball net and hands were cut from Sports Mania as was the volleyball. To make the card a little more interesting I placed my volleyball on an action wobble. See?

And that quote I mentioned earlier - it goes like this......

"Team means Together Everyone Achieves More!"

And now that you've seen my card hope on over to Just A Scrappin' and check out the other designs our team put together for your viewing pleasure this week. Then after you've been amply inspired create your own, link up and play along with us. I'd love to see what you create.

Squirreling Acorns

I love Saturday mornings.  Even though it's my day off I still wake up early and everyone else generally stays in bed for a couple of hours giving me time to enjoy a cup or two of coffee and some quite crafting time.  This morning I was able to get a couple of cards put together for upcoming challenges.

In the meantime, I wanted to share with you another project I created for the Create a Critter 2 sneak peek contest Cricut was running last week.  There were a lot of awesome projects entered into the contest and they're supposed to announce the winner/s on Monday and I can't wait to see who's picked.

This project is a Fall home decor project and because of the mat size with this frame I created my picture just like I would for a card.  The opening measures 5 x 7 so I of course started with a background piece of cardstock on which to build my picture.

Using a paper trimmer, I cut two rectangles - brown 4 x 3 1/2" and red 3 3/4 x 3 1/4" and then two squares brown 3 1/2" and green 3 1/4".  The red and green squares I embossed using the swiss dots folder and inked all edges.

From Accent Essentials I cut what started as a scalloped circle but ended up as a scalloped rectangle.  I made two different sized cuts so that one would mat the other while allowing enough room for my squirrel to be framed.

From Create a Critter 2 I cut the pilgrim squirrel at 2" and three acorns at 1".  While putting the picture together I decided to see if I had wiggle eyes that would 'fit' the squirrel's face while adding to the cute factor, and I think these were successful.

Other than that it was placing the picture in the mat, putting on the back and standing my new picture up on the table for display.

Flocking In....

Happy Friday everyone!  Can  you believe it's finally here?  I don't know about you but I didn't think Friday was ever going to come this week.  And since it's here that means it's time for another Pause Dream Enjoy Design Team Challenge.

This week our team put together a bunch of great designs featuring pink flamingos - or spotlighted just the color pink. Using my handy dandy Life's A Beach cartridge I cut out a few flamingos at 2 1/2 and 3 inches.  My bright idea was that I was going to cut off some of the heads and just have them poking in around the card but that just didn't look right.  So back to the drawing board I went and after a few thoughts I decided to focus on the one flamingo and created the oval stage for her.  Then taking a couple of the smaller flamingos I 'decorated' the inside of my card like this......

And now that you have seen my take on this week's challenge be sure to hop on over to Pause Dream Enjoy to check out all the other great designs our team put together.  Then create you own, link up, and play along for your chance to win.

Our Sponsor for this week's challenge is Clear Dollar Stamps!  who is offering a $5 Gift Certificate to their store!  So come on, what are you waiting for?  I can't wait to see what you create.

Dogbot Critter Cuttie

Happy Wednesday from the always raining sunshine state.  Yep, it's another rainy day here in the Panhandle of Florida and I've lost count of how many days of rain we've had lately.  Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for it because we need it but with all we've had you'd think there was a Tropical Storm over us or something.

But anyhoo, I wanted to share a card with you today that I created for the 114th challenge over at Cricut Cardz Challenge.  Our directive today - "Make a card using a “critter” (dog, cat, cow, chicken, duck, horse, etc.) from any cartridge(s), and using any colors or theme you’d like."  How easy is that?

As you can see, my critter is the cute little dogbot from the Robotz cartridge.  The scalloped squares were cut using Accent Essentials.

And now that you've seen my card for this week's challenge be sure to pop in to take a look at all the other wonderful designs our team made for you this week.  Then after you've been amply inspired, create your own design, link up and play along with us.  I can't wait to see what you come up with.

Sweet Summer Treats

Happy Friday everyone. It's time for another fun challenge over at Pause Dream Enjoy and our design team has created some wonderful projects for you.  The directive for this challenge was to create a project using any sweet summer treat of our choosing.

Of course when one thinks about sweet summer treats the first things that generally come to mind are berries, watermelon, and ice cream.  But what about all the other yummies that the season has to offer like sumptuous, fresh off the vine tomatoes or how about those delightful pitchers of lemonade that scream out to us whether the kids are around or not?  And it was that line of thinking that brought me to creating my card with a pitcher of lemonade as the focal point.

I used Block Party for my lemonade pitcher, cutting the top layer from a piece of plastic that had somewhat of a 'design' to it.  My reasoning being that I felt it would make the pitcher look more realistic.

The small circle that says "Life" was cut from George.

The flowers were all cut from Accent Essentials.  Oh, look at the purple on one the inside of the card.  That's a perfect example of how to use a 'mistake' to your advantage.  I misjudged where to place my paper on the mat and it cut off the tips of the two bottom legs on my flower.  Instead of throwing it out though I decided to strategically adhere to the very bottom edge of the card so that no one would be the wiser.  Well, except for you guys.....lol

Now that you've seen my take on this week's challenge hop on over to take a look at all the other yummy projects our team has created.  Then after you've been amply inspired, create your own sweet summer treat, link up and play along for your chance to win a $5 gift certificate from

 http://www.gingersnapscraps.com/

Thanks for stopping by and I look forward to seeing what you create.

Sunsets

Happy Friday everyone.  I am excited to announce that I have been chose to participate with yet another great Design Team.  This one is the Pause Dream Enjoy Team, and just as with the other two teams that I am a part of you won't want to miss any of the upcoming challenges.

This week our challenge over at PDE was to create a project with Sunset as the theme using either the colors of a sunset or a sunset itself as the focal point.  So when was the last time you watched the sun set (or rise for that matter)?  I used to watch it rise every morning on the drive in to work but now that I work closer to home I have not watched it rise in a while.  Watching it set though is another story and seeing the sun set over the Gulf of Mexico (or even the bay) is a breathtaking moment with all the beauty and splendor that is displayed before your eyes.

So all of that said, I wanted to try to capture at least some of that awe in my card.  So I created layers of sunset colors as my background. 

To do this I cut 1" scalloped borders from Accent Essentials.  I think inked along the scallops and laid them out in what I felt was the best color pattern for a sunset scheme.  I then used A Child's Year and Campin Critters to create my silhouette shapes.

And now that you've seen my creation hop on over to Pause Dream Enjoy and check out the other fabulous designs that our team created.  Then after you have been amply inspired, create your own sunset project and link up for your chance to win a $5 gift certificate to Ginger Snap Scraps.  You have until Thursday, July 12th to submit your project - I look forward to see what you come up with.

Happy 4th of July

I hope that today's post finds everyone of you doing well and enjoying some fun time with your friends/family.  Being in the hospitality industry (and this being one of the busiest weeks at the over three dozen communities my company manages) I will be one of the many who have to work.....but that's okay because I'll only be working for half of it. 

In the meantime, I wanted to encourage all of you to join us over at Just a Scrappin for our July 4th challenge.  The rules for this particular challenge are to create a July 4th project (card, layout, etc) using the colors red, white, blue and two others. 

For whatever reason I missed the color blue as one of the given colors and chose it as one of my 2nd colors.  Sorry about that.  Nonetheless I trust that everyone will approve of my creation. 

This was a rather easy card to create and required only two cartridges:

Accent Essentials and A Child's Year

I created a flag for my background using the scallop border from Accent Essentials and then as you can see chose a July 4th silhouette for my focal point.

Let's not forget the sentiment!  For this card I needed something special.  So I chose:

"How important it is

for us to recognize and celebrate

our heroes and she-roes!

~ Maya Angelou"

And now that you've seen my project be sure to hop over to Just A Scrappin to see all the other fabulous projects created by Team One of Design Team group.  Then after you have been amply inspired create your own project, link up, and play along with us.

You Blow Me Away

Here's my next card that was made to fit the quote.  Although I can't take full credit for this one because I saw a card in one of the many paper crafting magazines that had a stamped card like this in it.  Of course the light bulb went off when I saw it and I knew it had to be done.

As you can tell this was also another easy card to put together and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.  For this card I used:

Girl's Make-up Party for the blow dryer
Accent Essentials for the scalloped circle

My background paper on this one is from the mat stack All About Girls by DCWV.  I wanted this to be a bright, fun card and thus my shades of orange, blue and green.

Be sure to stay tuned for my next quote constructed card.  It's sure to be a 'toad-il' hit.

Get Well Flowers

Who remembers when making these flower pot cards were all the rage about two years ago?  I loved these cards then and I still love them now.  I have so much fun making these little guys and whenever I give one away the recipient always smiles upon seeing their card.

With that said, who wouldn't want to put a smile on the face of someone who's under the weather and not feeling well?  Of course we all do and so today I'd like to share one of my "get well" flower arrangements.  For this card I used my trusty little DS cut file I created back in the day using:

George for the 'card' and flower pot
Mickey and Friends for the flowers
Accent Essentials for the leaves
Sesame Street Friends for the worm
TBBM for the flower tag
Pooh Font for the Get Well

To put this together I used pop dots on the flowers and this helps to situate them just right so they slide in and out of the pot properly without hiding the sentiment.  Add some buttons for the center of the flowers and a ribbon around the pot to hold it all together and viola! You have a unique floral arrangement to show that special someone you care.

If you have the cartridges mentioned above and still use DS like I do, you can download my cut file by going here and selecting the flowerpot - friend and get well file.

Happy Creating!

Give Thanks - First Published Work

It has long since been a dream of mine to have one of my "works" published.  For a couple years now I have sent items in to a couple of magazines (like so many of you I'm sure) hoping upon hope that they would pick me to be published.  But month after month it was not meant to be........until one happy day last year when I received word that Cricut Magazine wanted to publish my submission in the November 2011 edition.

And now that the issue is over a month old I am able to share my submission with all of you.  For this projects I used:

A Child's Year for the fonts, cut at 1 1/2"
Accent Essentials for the scalloped shapes cut at 4 1/2", 5" and 6" all layered using pop dots
George for the circle cut at 8"
Thanksgiving for the corn cut at 3 1/2"

Oh, and guess what.  I just received word yesterday that another of my projects has been accepted for publication in the upcoming July issue...............

Tag, You're It!

Today's post is brought to you by Cricut Cardz Challenge #98 where today we present you with two different Christmas tags using any cartridges of our liking.  As you will see I chose several cartridges.  And you might also notice that one of my tags is a recreation of a tag originally created by Scrapping Mommy.  Truth by told these tags offered me that final push I needed to go ahead and buy the Winter Frolic cartridge, and I'm so glad I did.

All of that said, I created these two tags using:

Winter Frolic for the Christmas tree
Accent Essentials for the scalloped tag
Tags, Bags, Boxes and More for the snowman's tag
Gypsy Wanderings for the Snowman

Say it With "S" Challenge

I hope that everyone has enjoyed the cards I've shared over the last couple of days.  Today's card was created for this week's Cricut Cardz Challenge.  Our directive this week was to create a card using any image that started with the letter 's'.

For my card I chose:

Snowflake - cut from Accent Essentials embossed with the snowflakes folder and then lightly inked with broken china distress ink

Santa hat (and bird) - cut from Jolly Holidays

The words Merry Christmas were also cut from Jolly Holidays.

And now that you've seen my take on this week's challenge be sure to check out the other fabulous designs our team created.  Then create your own and link up to play along with us.

Old Fashion Santa

I love the way that this card turned out and wish that you could see it in real life because I promise that it looks better than the picture.  I made this one using Christmas Solutions/Noel, Accent Essentials and George (for the ribbon holes).

I chose this particular Santa cut because I thought it was perfect for the paper - another Tim Holtz Seasonal mat stack selection.  On the inside of my card I even printed one of the clip art pics of Santa under my sentiment to help finish/compliment the card.  And because I like the look it gave I decided to start doing that on the inside of all my cards that I don't actually scrap.

So what are you doing for your Christmas cards this year?  Are you doing just one design or are you designing a different card for each person on your list?  I'd love to hear how you're doing yours.......

Christmas Light

I was looking through one of my card magazines and saw an advertisement that had this card layout in it.  I loved it so much I just had to scraplift it!

I used:

Christmas Solutions/Noel for the street light cut at 6 1/4" and then stretched to widen just a bit
Accent Essentials for the scalloped oval and oval - both of which were circles that I skewed into the oval shape

The paper is from Tim Holtz's Seasonal mat stack.  Don't you just love all things Tim Holtz?  I know I do.

Elf Approved

Hello fellow bloggers.  I hope that today's post finds you and yours doing well.  As I sit in my craft room smelling the wonderful smell of Spruce mixed with Apple Cinnamon thanks to the air fresheners around my doorway I'd like to share another installment in my Christmas card collection this season.

Today's card is another that was inspired by one I saw in a magazine.  I don't remember which one but the card had an elf and a little tag that said "elf approved".  I thought it was a great card and chose to re-create the theme (not the card itself) using:

Jolly Holidays for the elf pulling his wagon
Christmas solutions for the bear and the baby doll
Christmas Cheer for the gift
Accent Essentials for the tag (which is pop dotted for effect)

Happy Graduation

I had a few leftovers from my daughter's graduation cards that I made a couple weeks ago so I decided not to waste. ......

Yep, all I changed was the you're invited to Happy Graduation using the Graduation cartridge and now it's the perfect card to give to a graduate.  Best thing about this card is that the colors are those of my local high school as well as FSU so I won't have any problems finding someone to give this one too.

The inside sentiment says - Now - go confidently in the direction of your dreams.  ~ Henry David Thoreau

Last of the Onsies

Finally, finally, finally I have finished the last of all the onsie albums I needed to get made.  For the longest time I had an inspirational block but then I found the Cricut Lite cartridge 9 months and it was game on.  Not all of the pages for these albums used the new cartridge but it at least got me out of my funk.

And with that I wanted to share the new pages I made for these particular albums.

For the covers I used 9 months for the blocks and the heaven sent.

This cute little elephant is also from 9 months.

Now I know that the tubs are nothing new, but I found these great "bubbles" with the cutesy buttons at Michael's this past weekend and just had to redo these pages.

And finally, these cute rubber duckies were perfect for this new baby print I found.  The ducks and the hands are both from A Child's Year.

Halloween Envelope Album

I purchased this wonderful little Halloween envelope album kit from Scrapbook.com a few weeks ago and finally had the opportunity to sit down and put it all together this weekend. I had a lot of fun with this one and even broke out some old and new cartridges as well as some Martha Stewart punches that had not been used in a while - if at all.

So let's break it down..........For the cover of the album I use Happy Hauntings for my cuts.  When adhering my headless horseman I wanted the pumpkin raised so I cut it away from the die cut and then pop dotted for a better effect.

For this page I used Happy Hauntings once again along with some papers from Tim Holtz and DCWV and then used my MS cracks punch around the page set.

Happy Hauntings and Accent Essentials were used for this page along with some stickers from the Booville collection from My Little Yellow Bicycle.  Oh and I used my MS Drippy Goo punch.

On this page I used a cut from the October 31st cartridge and this is one that I just purchased this summer but had not yet found an opportunity to use - until now.

For this page I broke out one of the 'oldies' - Paper Dolls Dress Up for the spider web.  After cutting, I ran it through my Xyron and then sprinkled on some glitter fibers.  The spiders are from a Recollections pack in my stash.

The eyes have it......or so they say.....lol.....these eyes are cut from October 31st.....gotta love that sinister, don't mess with me look they give.

And last, but not least, my ending pages.....nothing fancy - just a couple of rectangles punched and distressed.